July 2, 2025

Improvements have been made to our Nutrition Outreach Camps!

For children in Nepal’s most remote regions, life-saving nutritional support can be incredibly hard to access. That’s why Nepal Youth Foundation (NYF) launched Nutrition Outreach Camps—mobile programs designed to bring the most critical components of our Nutritional Rehabilitation Home (NRH) model directly to families in rural communities. These camps combine education, screening, treatment referrals, and community empowerment into a few intensive days of care.

Over the years, we’ve learned valuable lessons from each camp—about what worked well and what needed improvement. Our original model was a strong foundation, but it had limitations: short durations, limited follow-up, and difficulty reaching the most remote communities.

Today, our updated model is more mobile, more hands-on, and more sustainable—bringing lasting change to families who need it most. In 2023–24 alone, NYF’s Nutrition Outreach efforts reached over 7,500 children across Nepal through full-scale camps and school-based screenings. Click here to view a PDF graphic explaining this new model.

Reaching Even the Most Remote Communities

Original Model: In the past, NYF’s Nutrition Outreach Camps were held in remote but accessible regions. However, we were often limited by unreliable vehicles, long travel times, and a lack of transportation options—especially for sick children and their families.

New Model: Thanks to our new all-terrain vehicle and the expanding array of NRHs across Nepal, we are now able to reach even more difficult-to-access communities than ever before.

Extended Camp Duration for Deeper Impact

Original Model: Our original model involved setting up a single large camp in a central location within one day’s walking distance of several villages. Families had to invest significant time and energy to reach us, and our team had only a short window to spend with each child.

New Model: Now, each camp lasts five to six days, and rather than asking families to come to us, we bring the services directly to them. Every day, our team moves to a new venue, visiting each individual village. This allows families—especially those with sick children—to reach us more easily and gives our team more time with each child.

Building Long-Term Community Resilience

Original Model: Previously, one major challenge was our limited ability to follow up with families after the camps. While we did provide open-air informational workshops and personalized nutritional counseling, only caregivers who brought their children to NRHs received hands-on training and follow-up house visits. Others had to rely on secondhand information from neighbors.

New Model: Now, we’ve built robust community follow-up into the program. Following each camp, a field staff member remains in the area for several more days to ensure sustainable community change. This includes visiting each village to conduct longer follow-up nutritional trainings for families, teachers, and health care workers; making house calls to those experiencing malnutrition to provide more hands-on training; identifying and screening children who did not attend the camp; arranging more transportation to nearby NRHs; and returning to provide more follow-up training several times over the next year.

Smarter Use of Specialist Support

Original Model: In the original model, we brought pediatricians from Kathmandu hospitals to each camp. While this provided access to expertise, it also limited our travel time and camp duration, added significant costs, and sometimes distracted families from participating in nutritional workshops. Very little medical equipment could be brought along, and children still often needed referrals to facilities for proper diagnosis and treatment.

New Model: Now, NYF’s trained nursing team is fully equipped to identify children in need of non-nutritional pediatric care. Rather than bringing pediatricians along, our team coordinates referrals and transports sick kids to appropriate medical resources—helping us maintain high-quality care while being more efficient. Children with routine ailments like eczema, ringworm, and mild skin infections receive over-the-counter medicines without needing to see a specialist.

Hands-On Learning at NYF’s Nutrition Outreach Camps

Using fresh, locally grown ingredients, NYF’s nutrition team prepares and packages lito in-house to distribute at Nutrition Outreach Camps. But beyond distribution, we also teach caregivers how to make it at home, emphasizing how small, affordable dietary changes can yield big results. For many children who are mildly or moderately malnourished, swapping just one serving of rice per day for a serving of lito can significantly improve their nutritional status—no hospital visit required.

This simple but powerful solution exemplifies our goal: to empower families with tools they can use long after the camp has ended.

At the December 2023 Bethanchowk Nutrition Outreach Camp, NRH cook and meal prep trainer **Goma Khatri** managed the popular “lito desk.” Lito—a beloved traditional comfort food made from roasted and ground corn, wheat, and soybeans—is highly nutritious, easily digestible, and widely accepted by children, even those who are very young.

Nutrition Education in Action

While families wait to visit with nurses and nutritionists, NYF’s team sets up an interactive nutrition education space, complete with displays of traditional Nepali grains and vegetables like lentils, peas, beans, chickpeas, corn, wheat, squash, broccoli, and cauliflower.

These presentations offer practical, easy-to-understand guidance on how to make meals more nutritious using ingredients families already know and grow. Afterward, caregivers and children are invited to take a closer look at the display and ask follow-up questions—turning waiting time into a valuable learning opportunity. It’s one more way NYF is helping to build lasting nutrition habits, right at the community level.

Also at the Bethanchowk Nutrition Outreach Camp, 12-year-old *Nisha* approached Nutrition Coordinator **Sunita Rimal** with an insightful question during a presentation—demonstrating just how curious and engaged young participants can be. (*Name changed for privacy.)

A Smarter Model, A Healthier Future

At NYF, we believe that no child should suffer from malnutrition simply because of where they live. By continually improving the design of our Nutrition Outreach Camps, we’re making it easier for families to access the resources they need—while investing in the long-term health of entire communities.

This is more than outreach. It’s empowerment, and it’s one more way NYF is ensuring that children across Nepal have the opportunity to grow up healthy, strong, and ready to thrive. To learn more about our Nutritional Outreach Camps, visit our program page.