Adolescence is a critical time in the life cycle, presenting what is sometimes called a "second window of opportunity" in an individual’s growth and development. USAID Advancing Nutrition believes that the international development community must give greater attention to the nutritional status and practices of this age group.
Addressing the nutritional needs of adolescents presents unique challenges, given their varied household, school, work, marital, and parental circumstances. USAID Advancing Nutrition launched an online Adolescent Nutrition Resource Bank, with over 150 resources, to help governments, donors, non-governmental organizations, and other adolescent nutrition stakeholders advocate for, design, implement, deliver, monitor, and evaluate effective adolescent nutrition programs and services.
This webinar focused on why it’s important to prioritize adolescent nutrition, what is included in the USAID Advancing Nutrition Adolescent Nutrition Resource Bank, and how selected resources might be useful for you.
Webinar Recording
Webinar Resources
- Access the slide deck (PDF, 5.47 MB)
- View webinar transcript (PDF, 307 KB)
Speakers
Peggy Koniz-Booher (Moderator) is a Senior Technical Advisor with the USAID Advancing Nutrition project and the Nutrition Champion for JSI Research and Training Institute. She is an international public health nutritionist and social and behavior change communication specialist with more than 25 years of experience in over 35 countries. She has expertise in maternal, infant and young child nutrition; family planning/reproductive health; and the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Ms. Koniz-Booher is known globally for the development of high quality counselling and training tools, and the promotion of innovations in Social and Behavior Change Communication, including the use of community videos for nutrition.
Kellie Stewart is the Chief of the Nutrition and Environmental Health Division in the Bureau for Global Health. Kellie has been with USAID for over 20 years, serving both in Washington and the field. She has led efforts on a broad range of development and emergency response programs including multi-sectoral nutrition, health system reform, maternal and child health, vector control, HIV, family planning and reproductive health. Kellie started her development career as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guatemala and Honduras. She has a BA in Sociology from the University of California, Santa Cruz and an MHS from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Debendra Adhikari leads the implementation of USAID Nepal’s nutrition portfolio and coordinates the Mission’s Nutrition and Food Security Working Group. Mr. Adhikari manages the $86 million USAID Nepal’s bilateral integrated nutrition project Suaahara II, Feed the Future’s Nutrition Innovation Lab, and other USAID supported nutrition activities in Nepal. He has over fifteen years of experience in nutrition and maternal and child health programs, working with the Government of Nepal, INGOs and USAID Nepal. Mr. Debendra holds Master of Public Health degree from the Institute of Medicine at Tribhuvan University in Nepal and a Master of Nutrition Science and Policy degree from the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University in the United States.
Sascha Lamstein is a Senior Technical Advisor with the USAID Advancing Nutrition project. Prior to this, she worked on the USAID-funded SPRING project and served as a monitoring and evaluation advisor for John Snow, Inc. Dr. Lamstein has focused her attention on strengthening the delivery of nutrition services through preservice training, the use of digital tools, the strategic selection and adaptation of service delivery packages, and the application of systems thinking for nutrition. She co-led SPRING’s evaluation of the community infant and young child feeding (C-IYCF) counseling package in Nigeria and under both SPRING and USAID Advancing Nutrition work has played a role in advocating for increased attention to adolescent girls’ nutrition.
Farrah Naz is the Country Director of the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) in Pakistan. Ms. Naz has extensive experience in development and humanitarian context, stemming from her educational background in Rural Development with a specialization in Gender Relations & Agrarian Change. Ms. Naz has worked with several NGOs, INGOs and the UN. Over the years, she has been engaged in research on women’s issues, programming on food security, sustainable livelihoods, girls’ education, Disaster Risk Reduction, child protection, women’s and girls’ rights, gender-based violence and disability.
Maxwell Mumba is a Zambian youth advocate and psychosocial counsellor. Mr. Mumba is Youth Leader for Nutrition in Zambia and a Real Change Fellow, sponsored by RESULTS and ACTION. In these roles, Mr. Mumba advocates for health and education issues in Zambia. Mr. Mumba is currently providing program assistance to the CSO-SUN Alliance as the Youth Lead of the National Youth Network on SDGs under CSO-SUN.
Theresa Sayavong is the Technical Specialist for Community Health for the USAID Integrated Nutrition and WASH project, USAID Nurture, with a focus on improving the quality of integrated nutrition services offered at the primary healthcare level. Ms. Sayavong has a Master of Public Health degree from George Washington University and has dedicated the past 4 years to developing and implementing nutrition and WASH programming in communities across Lao PDR.
Victoria Marijani is currently working with Save the Children International in Tanzania as a Social and Behavior Change and Gender Advisor for the 5-year nutrition project USAID Lishe Endelevu. She has been a board member for Restless Development in Tanzania for two years. Prior to Save the Children, Ms. Marijani was working as a Communication Manager at Thamini Uhai, an affiliate of vital strategies in Tanzania to support national efforts to reduce maternal and perinatal mortality through strengthening health services. Prior to Thamini Uhai, Ms. Marijani worked for Population Services International (PSI) for 6 years in various positions such as Product Manager, Project Manager, Providers Behavior Change and Communication Manager in Tanzania, and Communication Associate with PSI Global based in Nigeria.
Catharine Fleming is a Lecturer in Public Health in the School Health Science, Western Sydney University and is Stream Co-Lead for Youth Participation and Engagement in the Young and Resilient Research Centre. Dr. Fleming has a PhD in pediatric nutrition and dietetics and over 12 years’ experience in pediatric nutrition relating to infant and young child feeding, pediatric food allergy and childhood obesity. Dr. Fleming has research experience in mixed methods, co design, clinical and public health research methodologies covering quantitative, qualitative and data linkage studies. This experience has involved working with families, children and population-based data in pediatric nutrition in a variety of clinical, community and global settings. Dr. Fleming is building a body of work focusing on protecting against lifelong chronic disease through investigating different aspects of feeding and diet in the most teachable moments of childhood and adolescents.
Amanda Third is a Professorial Research Fellow in the Institute for Culture and Society at Western Sydney University; Co-Director of the Young and Resilient Research Centre; and Faculty Associate in the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard. An international expert in child-centred, participatory research, Professor Third’s work investigates the impact of social equity issues on children and their rights, with an emphasis on children's technology practices. With her colleagues, she has developed unique, cross-national, online and offline, participatory child consultation methods, and has led child-centred projects to understand children’s experiences in over 70 countries, working with partners across corporate, government and not-for-profit sectors and children and young people themselves.