Impacts on Early Emotional Development

I choose to focus on Ethiopia because my friends just recently adopted a baby from there.  I was curious to know what type of environment their little guy came from as an attempt to better understand why my friends choose to adopt a child from Ethiopia. 

                The children in Ethiopia are facing challenges that are affecting their development.  For instance, children are not receiving proper nutrition due to living in poverty that contributes to their ability to achieve developmental milestones.  For instance, ‘’not long ago, it was common for children under the age of 5 to receive treatment for severe malnutrition in this Ethiopian community. Today, a community-based nutrition programs is keeping children strong and healthy and families resilient’’ ("UNICEF - Ethiopia - Celebrating nutrition achievements in Wolaita", n.d.).  Through these community based nutrition programs children are weighed as an attempt to evaluate malnutrition.  After children are weighed, mothers are either counseled on possible reasons, provided solutions, and/or praised and then encouraged to continue feeding children property. 

                The community based nutrition programs in Ethiopia are influencing children’s emotional well being and development by providing them with resources to counterbalance their quality of life which influence children to thrive and achieve developmental milestones as a result because ‘’young children from food-insecure households are two-thirds more likely to be at risk of developmental problems than those from households with enough to eat’’ ("Nutrition & Child Development | No Kid Hungry | End Child Hunger in America", n.d.).  For instance, in the past children in Ethiopia were dying at an increasingly high rate due to severe malnutrition, but now Ethiopia provides mothers with resources to prevent malnutrition instead of treating malnutrition.  Focusing on prevention of malnutrition instead of treatment of malnutrition in children in Ethiopia has contributed to malnutrition rates dropping from 20% to 5%, and severe malnutrition rates dropping from 5% to about 1% ("UNICEF - Ethiopia - Celebrating nutrition achievements in Wolaita", n.d.).

                Concluding this assignment, I feel I have insight that has aided me in better understanding how children are affected by malnutrition.  Children around the world are affected by poverty that contributes to why they experience severe malnutrition.  The children in Ethiopia seem to be facing more issues with malnutrition in comparison to children in United States because here in the United States we have various resources in place in for children that provide them nutrition regardless of their families’ inability to provide these basic needs.  It makes me appreciate the programs we have in place here to counterbalance children and their families’ hardships. 

References

Nutrition & Child Development | No Kid Hungry | End Child Hunger in America. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.nokidhungry.org/problem/nutrition-child-development

UNICEF - Ethiopia - Celebrating nutrition achievements in Wolaita. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/ethiopia_70117.html