Dominican Republic

Project Name: Baseline Survey for Food Fortification Program

Start Date: March 2007

Background

The Dominican Republic wanted to conduct a micronutrient baseline survey for its national food fortification programs. Existing and planned fortification programs include the following efforts: 

• Existing voluntary fortification of wheat flour with iron, folic acid, and B-complex vitamins and changing the premix to wheat flour for bread to include higher levels of folic acid and a more bioavailable form of iron (ferrous fumarate) in addition to niacin, thiamin, and riboflavin.
• Existing voluntary fortification of maize flour with various vitamins and minerals including vitamin A, vitamin E, folic acid, other B-complex vitamins, and reduced iron. 
• Existing universal salt iodization program. 
• Planned voluntary fortification of sugar with vitamin A.

The CDC is assisting the the Dominican Republic government and its partners in developing the survey protocol, training survey staff, and ensuring appropriate quality controls for collecting all survey and biomarker data.

Purposes

The project has the following purposes:

• Assess the prevalence of anemia and the nutritional status of iron, folic acid, vitamin A, and iodine among nonpregnant women 15 to 49 years of age.
• Assess the prevalence of anemia and the nutritional status of iron and vitamin A among young children 6 to 59 months of age.
• Assess the use of iron, folic acid, and calcium supplementation among nonpregnant women 15 to 49 years of age and the use of iron supplementation among children 6 to 59 months of age. 
• Assess the availability, coverage and intake of fortified foods (i.e., salt, wheat flour, bread, maize flour, sugar).

Target Group(s)

The target groups consist of nonpregnant women 15 to 49 years of age and children 6 to 59 months of age.

Progress

Baseline data collection was completed in April 2009.

Future Plans  

Future plans include the following activities:

• Develop a monitoring and evaluation system for fortification of sugar, wheat flour, maize flour, and salt.

Partners

CDC works with the following partners on this project:

• Secretaría de Estado de Salud Pública y Asistencia Social (SESPAS), Dominican Republic
• Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN)
• World Bank

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