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"id": 233104,
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"speaker_name": "Mr Boit",
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"legal_name": "William Kiplumbei Boit",
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"content": "Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, thank you for this opportunity. I want to second this very important Bill of Nutritionists and Dieticians. I am very glad that at in this point in time in this nation we are focused on the importance of nutrition. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, during the colonial times, the Government at that time felt it necessary to deploy enrolled nurses to do the work of nutritionists in the field. I think the Mover has just mentioned it very lightly that in most hospitals those days, enrolled nurses were just taken for a small course and they were taught how to treat people as per nutritional values of food in the hospitals and in the field. That shows that essentially there was need for nutritionists and, in fact, when we attained Independence, the Government opened Karen College and started training enrolled nurses who had been introduced to nutrition. We offered them full training to become nutrition technicians and we introduced a certificate course for school leavers who eventually studied for two years and qualified as nutrition technicians. We then made progress and trained also diploma nutrition technologists. Now, most universities in this country are training nutritionists under degree programmes. That indicates that this nation requires nutritionists. Why do we require nutritionists? Food is one of the basic requirements in our lives. Ninety per cent of what we do concerns food; in the establishment of our bodies' metabolism and everything that our bodies need concerns food. Thus, we have to manage the food element in this nation. We need to manage what people eat and plant. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, as the previous speaker mentioned, there are very many diseases and conditions affecting people, like obesity, diabetes, hypertension, stress, et cetera . These conditions can be prevented very easily if we manage people's eating habits. We should not allow this to continue. If you go back to the field, you will find that in some areas, people eat meat continuously, and that affects the health of a person. Others eat rice or other kinds of food 3926 PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES November 23, 2006 continuously, and that affects their bodies. We need to ensure that people take meals with the correct nutritional value. We should mix the food that people eat, so that it can enable the body mechanism function properly, so that when children go to school, they think properly. I am sure that the Government is now embarking on production of good food through agriculture as well as provision of clean water and the education part of it. These three sectors are very important on the production of food. We are now serious. We are going to train nutritionists. However, we cannot do so if the basic requirements in the field are not available. We want the Ministry of Agriculture to introduce food crops in areas where such crops cannot be grown. Mr. Speaker, Sir, some food crops take three months to mature in certain areas. In other areas, they may take even a shorter period. Even in arid areas, with the help of irrigation, we can produce foodstuffs for human consumption and grass for livestock and have plenty of meat. The Ministry of Water and Irrigation can provide plenty of water, so that animals can feed and have plenty of meat. It is very important for these Ministries to be given enough money, so that we can introduce the activities I have mentioned. We need to include nutrition as a subject in our school curriculum. Children must be taught about nutrition. I remember that when I was in school, we used to have studies on health sciences. We used to do crop rotation in the school farms. Basically, we were being taught that we needed to have the food that we take improved. That is very important. This Bill captures all these aspects, so that this nation can have healthy people. A good nation must have healthy people, who are capable of thinking straight. In this respect, food is essential. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, the Bill we are introducing captures all these aspects. It seeks to provide for the creation of councils and boards. Once this Bill is passed, these bodies will organise themselves. The Mover has given us a lot of the details in this Bill. I am seconding her because, at this age and time, Kenya cannot be left to lag behind. I have had a chance to visit Japan. That country takes matters of nutrition seriously. There is a whole university which trains nutritionists only, and you cannot be called a nutritionist until you have a doctorate degree. The students of that university study patients in hospitals, including pregnant mothers. They monitor the nutrition trends in a pregnant woman until she gives birth. Further, they monitor the child's growth, noting the foodstuffs it is fed on and the diseases it suffers from, et cetera . They prescribe everything that, that child requires. To them, it is serious business. A nutritionist monitors the kind of food you eat, in all the seasons, as well as the exercises you do. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, in Japan, even veterinary doctors are trained on the nutritional needs of animals. They must study and pass a paper on nutrition. It is high time that Kenya also introduces such elements. We must be all rounders, so that we can have a healthy nation. I am very glad that even the Kenya Bureau of Standards gives a breakdown of nutritional quantities of food commodities as they analyse them for approval. That tells us how much our bodies require. Some unscrupulous businessmen can give us substandard commodities. Right now, if you take most of the commodities on sale in supermarkets for analysis, they will not meet the required standards. That is why we need a law to protect us in terms of the foodstuffs we buy. Everybody should be educated. We need to train the people in the field to know what they need to eat. University communities, school children, their teachers and everybody else must be aware of what they need to eat. I am very glad that we are now introducing a law on nutrition. I very strongly support the Bill. With those remarks, I beg to second."
}