Comprehensive Micronutrient Strategy in Haiti

In order to identify a reproducible, cost-effective and sustainable solution to small-scale fortification, PHC began work with the Entrepreneurial Design for Extreme Affordability class at Stanford University. Students were challenged to redesign the technology used in current small-scale fortification projects to make them less expensive and more convenient for use in rural settings. A promising prototype was developed, but in order to create a fully functioning device that was appropriate in the rural, village context, an experimental site was needed.

With this challenge in mind and based on the relationship PHC had cultivated with Partners In Health (PIH) in Rwanda, a partnership was formed between Zanmi Lasante (ZL), Zanmi Agrikol and PHC This partnership provided access to an existing food mill at ZL, the flagship project for Partners in Health in the Central Plateau of Haiti. The newly designed device was mounted to the existing mill and micronutrients were added to a mixture of cereal and legumes called Nourimil. The decisions made and lessons learned through initial fortification in the small mill, will inform how best to design fortification methods with the new, commercial-grade mill facility ZL is planning to add in 2010.