Friday 10 March 2023, can be marked a historical day for Rotary District 7030 as District Governor Leslie Ramdhannie met with Representatives of the CARICOM Secretariat, Ms. Helen Royer, Director of Human Development and Ms. Curvelle David, Deputy Programme Manager, Health Sector Development, Directorate for Human and Social Development at the CARICOM Headquarters in Guyana.
The District Governor was accompanied by Dr. Virginia Asin-Oostburg, District 7030 Lead for the Childhood Obesity Prevention Program and Ms. Elizabeth Cox, Assistant Governor for Guyana. The purpose of the visit was to formally introduce the work of the District to the Caribbean Community Secretariat as the administrative arm of the Caribbean Community.
District Governor Leslie presented Rotary as a worldwide organization that serves communities around the world. In his introduction, he shared information on the leadership of District 7030 and its role in prioritizing sustainable programs that benefit communities across the Caribbean.
In describing Rotary’s support to the community, he shared that priorities are taken to the country level and executed by the 74 clubs belonging to Rotary District 7030. Specifically, he spoke about the Childhood Obesity Prevention program and the development and implementation of annual work plans which are intended to address the needs of the community.
“Childhood Obesity is a serious problem addressed through policies and legislation by CARICOM and the Technical Public Health institutions. We see an important role for us as Rotary in raising awareness, implementing targeted interventions and advocating for public and corporate policies to tackle the obesogenic environment”, said DG Leslie.
Dr. Virginia elaborated on the Childhood Obesity Prevention, COP - the background and status of the programme since its kick-off in 2020. She reemphasized the long-term nature of the Program and the commitment of Rotary to prioritize as a spear-point District program. In addition, she noted the importance of establishing a strong partnership with the CARICOM Secretariat to reduce the incidence of the childhood obesity by 2025. In her own words she indicated that “Given the composition of members (captains of industry and vocational experts) that make up Rotary, we as an organization are in the unique position to bring together key actors and stakeholders, to address the obesogenic environment (financial/food/build/etc.)”.
Assistant Governor Liz provided examples of the achievements over the past 3 years and made special mention of the Rotary “Eat Well” booklet that is being used in schools as a resource for children and teachers about healthy eating and physical activity. She also mentioned the gardening projects which are being undertaken by some clubs across the district.
Based on the information presented by the Rotary representatives, Mrs. Royer provided a synopsis of the recent work of CARICOM and the work done by the Health Sector Development Programme in the area of Childhood Obesity. She also highlighted the need for collaboration with other programmes such as the Human Resource Development programme, Agriculture and Development and Youth Development Programmes. In her intervention she added that actions have been taken to review the Health and Family Life Curriculum in a recent collaboration with University of the West Indies on a food and Nutrition Project (Fan project).
Ms Royer therefore stressed on the importance of harmonizing efforts to prevent duplication as some of the activities mentioned could be complimentary.
Ms. David also acknowledged the role that Rotary can play as a non-State actor in the fight against childhood obesity and sees value in fostering closer collaboration with the Rotary.
At the end of the meeting, it was agreed that as a next step, the Rotary COP team will work together with the secretariat to set up a follow up meeting with the different programmes involved, to concretize ways of working together on Childhood Obesity Prevention.