Healthy Baby Food in Nigeria with Latifat Okara

#38: In Nigeria, babies are traditionally weaned using a food called pap. It’s a cornmeal mixed with a water type of cereal that will certainly fill a baby up, but a dish that lacks important nutrients that babies need for adequate growth and development. Latifat Okara is working to change this. Through her company Nomnom Babies, Latifat is helping to educate primary care providers and parents about the wider array of wholesome foods that babies CAN and SHOULD be eating when starting solid foods.  In this interview Latifat shared some INCREDIBLE stories about how her own daughter was failing to meet her growth milestones because of limited variety and reliance on high carbohydrate staple foods that were failing to provide her with adequate nutrition..and how that experience led her to start incorporating other traditional foods into the weaning process like crayfish and brown beans and egg yolk and plantain… And I think you are really going to enjoy Latifat’s message - which is essentially that babies CAN eat so many more foods than we often give them credit for. In Nigeria 1 in 5 children is malnourished, and as Latifat will share in this episode - through the processes of unlearning and relearning she is working to redirect how drivers like racial discrimination, cultural beliefs, poverty and maternal education determine food choices and preferences for families in underserved parts of Nigeria. Listen to this episode to learn: The food pap (maize cereal) babies are traditionally fed in Nigeria and how overreliance on that food contributes to malnutrition...including a personal story about her own daughter barely grew from 8-12 months and how Latifat then helped rehabilitate her daughter with more wholesome, nutritious foods Her efforts to normalize the use of locally available foods that can be fed to babies - foods like crayfish and brown beans, eggs and plantains...and how too often we don’t give babies credit for all of the foods they CAN and SHOULD be eating Efforts to educate primary care providers and parents about starting solids and the need to unlearn and relearn practices related to racial discrimination, cultural beliefs, poverty and maternal education that determine food choices and preferences for families in Nigeria and around the world Shownotes for this episode can be found here: https://www.babyledweaning.co/podcast/38 Links from this episode: Helping Babies Get a Nutritious Start in Life - article about Latifat Okara’s work from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Nomnom Babies - Latifat’s infant weaning Instagram page @nomnom_babies Baby-Led Weaning with Katie Ferraro program with the 100 First Foods™ Daily Meal Plan, join here: https://babyledweaning.co/program  Baby-Led Weaning for Beginners free online workshop with 100 First Foods™ list to all attendees, register here: https://babyledweaning.co/baby-led-weaning-for-beginners 🌱 🌱🌱🌱 🌱 Not sure about which foods to offer your baby next? Get your copy of my original 100 FIRST FOODS list on my free online video workshop called BABY-LED WEANING FOR BEGINNERS. 💯 💯 💯 💯 💯 Want guided help on how to make all of the 100 FIRST FOODS™ safely for your baby? My program BABY-LED WEANING WITH KATIE FERRARO has a 100 FIRST FOODS daily meal plan and everything else you need to start solid foods safely with baby-led weaning. CLICK HERE TO JOIN. 👀 👀 👀 👀 👀 Be sure to follow @babyledweanteam on Instagram and our Baby-Led Weaning YouTube channel for more information about helping your baby transition to solid foods safely. 🙏 🙏 🙏 🙏 🙏 If you learned something from this episode and like this podcast, your review means the WORLD to us and helps other parents find this important evidence-based infant feeding info. Click here to leave a review on Apple podcasts or rate this show on Spotify podcasts and thanks for being a part of this amazing and supportive baby-led weaning community! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices