In partnership with the ENGIE Foundation, the Instituto Melhores Dias (Inmed Brasil) has since 2011 carried out the Crianças Saudáveis, Futuro Saudável (Healthy Children, Healthy Future) Project in communities of the areas directly and indirectly used by the Jirau and Estreito Hydroelectric Plants in the states of Rondônia and Maranhão, respectively, and the Trairi Wind Farm, in the state of Ceará. The Project’s purpose is to improve the health and living standards of children in the municipalities surrounding the projects, with benefits for 25 municipalities with low development levels, lacking sanitation and scarce drinking water. It therefore enables improving the quality of life for children and communities by means of educational actions that focus on hygiene, health, and nutrition as well as by means of dietary education. The program is highly replicable and has benefitted 19,000 schoolchildren.

Improved health standards for the children enrolled in the program are attained by means of interventions such as clinical and biomedical (parasitology, body-mass index and anemia) diagnoses and treatment, as well as building awareness of the importance of healthy eating and proper sanitary practices. Periodical examinations enable effectively tracking health gains and, consequently, improved scholarly performance. The program’s cornerstone is about turning children into agents for change, conveying messages on health eating and personal and environmental hygiene to their families.

Objectives

• To determine the nutritional status and improve the health conditions of participating children, using diagnoses produced at the beginning and the end of the program to produce results indicators;
• To promote participative education activities with parents and educators on the topics and preventive health, hygiene and sanitary education, using training programs, and didactic workshops to improve nutrition and foster the adoption of healthy living habits;
• To get the community involved in the Program’s activities and train teachers, community health and nutrition workers in topics such as health, nutrition, and solar water disinfection for human consumption (SODIS);
• In addition to improving access to drinking water through the SODIS method, which is easy to use and low-cast, to provide guidance for improvements in basic sanitation and waste collection;
• To build solid foundations for sustainability with long-term results involving local partners – organized society, municipal authorities and other bodies in support of the program’s actions;
• To encourage the use of foodstuffs present at the basis of the communities dietary source and the consumption of organic products, based on sustainable household farming.

Results

• In the short run, the program supports vital and community-appropriate aspects of nutrition, health prevention and healthy lifestyles;
• In the long-run, the community is effectively involved, improving the odds for sustainable actions;/li>
• Around 70,000 community members have benefitted from the program since 2011, in 25 municipalities with low human development indices (HDI) in the states of Rondônia, Ceará and Maranhão;
• A total of 25,600 children have been involved in the program’s educational actions for schoolchildren, with improved health standards;
• 15,105 children in the Program have received prophylactic treatment for anemia, and over 10,000 (children and community members) have been treated with anthelmintics for parasites;
• 83% improvement in anemia and worm infection rates among schoolchildren;
• 73% improvement in students’ awareness of the program’s topics;
• 81% improvement of teachers’ awareness of the program’s topics;
• Improved access to drinking water at schools and homes using the SODIS method;
• Partnerships between municipal authorities and schools, magnifying the multiplying power of the program’s activities;
• Distribution of water filters to families, as well as 10,000 oral hygiene kits.