Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Secretary Rex Gatchalian on Friday (April 4) presides over the 11th regular meeting of the Inter-Agency Task Force on Zero Hunger (IATF-ZH) at the DSWD Central Office in Quezon City.

The meeting focused on the government’s continuing initiatives to address hunger, food insecurity, and child stunting in the Philippines.

Updates on the Philippine Multisectoral Nutrition Project (PMNP) were jointly presented by Director Bernadette Mapue-Joaquin, Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive and Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS) National Program Manager; and Deputy Team Leader Ana Epefania
Escober of the Department of Health (DOH).

Other DSWD officials present at the meeting were Undersecretary Eduardo Punay and Assistant Secretary Baldr Bringas of the DSWD’s Innovation and Program Development Group (IPD), Asst. Secretary Johannes Paulus Acuña of the Information and Communications Technology Management Service
(ICTMS), and Director Miramel Laxa of the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP).

The meeting was also attended by representatives from Commission on Higher Education (CHED); Department of Budget and Management (DBM); Department of Agriculture (DA); Department of Trade and Industry (DTI); Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR); Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE);
Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG); and Department of Education (DepEd).

Chaired by the DSWD, the IATF-ZH is tasked to oversee the implementation and monitoring of nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive programs to address food insecurity in the country. (LSJ)