USAID Advancing Nutrition supports the USAID Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance and the USAID Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo to better understand how to improve coordination and collaboration among nutrition actors (e.g,. donors, government actors, program implementers) working to address wasting, a form of malnutrition in children under five that can lead to severe illness and death if untreated.

Coordination and collaboration are critical to achieving a continuum of care for malnourished children that includes both prevention and treatment aspects of wasting management services and activities. We are working with five health zones across two provinces, with a focus on identifying opportunities to strengthen coordination and collaboration at the local level.

We developed a learning agenda to guide this work, which has three objectives:

1. Document partners’ experiences collaborating to deliver the continuum of care for wasting
2. Identify and pilot actions to strengthen coordination and collaboration
3. Develop recommendations for how to strengthen collaboration to deliver the continuum of care for acute malnutrition

USAID Advancing Nutrition documented key challenges and opportunities from the national to health zone levels through a desk review, scoping visit, national-level workshop, and direct engagement with local nutrition actors. We supported action planning at the provincial- and health zone-level and are documenting implementation. USAID Advancing Nutrition will produce a report in French with recommendations on how to strengthen coordination and collaboration based on the lessons learned from this process.