Kajjansi Living Lab
Objective:
This living lab aims to promote the consumption of indigenous fruits and vegetables (IFVs) to improve cardiometabolic health. It focuses on empowering communities with food skills, enhancing dietary diversity, and addressing the double burden of malnutrition.
Activities:
- Community capacity building: Training Village Health Teams (VHTs) and women champions using a Train-the-Trainer approach to disseminate knowledge on IFV nutrition, preparation, and health benefits, while also addressing foodrelated barriers and misconceptions.
- Food production and self-sufficiency: Promoting backyard and kitchen gardens for indigenous fruit and vegetable cultivation, while reducing dependency on external food sources.
- Nutrition education and awareness: Conducting outreach through media channels, community dialogues, and focus group discussions.
- Research and Food innovation and skill development: Co-creating IFV-based dishes, food tasting events, and recipe development workshops to encourage dietary shifts.
- Stakeholder engagement and food systems mapping: Identifying key actors, developing a strategic communication plan, and designing multi-stakeholder collaboration framework to strengthen linkages between health, agriculture, and nutrition sectors.