ILIGAN CITY, Lanao del Norte, Philippines (PIA) – Experts from the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI) conducted an actual demonstration on manufacturing sweets out of squash vegetable in the city recently.

Some 100 women from the villages of Abuno and Tipanoy, this city, witnessed how Science Research Specialist Josie Gonzales of the FNRI prepared the squash into delicacies like squash flan, “maha,” and even “ukoy.”

Among the sweets/delicacies under the FNRI’s livelihood training program that could be produced out of squash vegetable are “kutsinta,” “suman,” and “halaya,” that Gonzales introduced.

For his part, Oliver Yap, Iligan City Nutrition Action and Population Program Officer, said this training program is aimed at empowering stakeholders of the Accelerated Hunger Mitigation Program in the project sites through nutrition  communication and technology transfer, with the FNRI’s “SIGLANG PINOY” Project.

The training will help create marketing products out of the squash sweets through the assistance of the City Development Livelihood Office, Yap added.

He said that the program focuses on squash technology because the two villages are main producers of squash in this city.

Various nutrients can also be acquired from squash vegetable, Yap explained.

These villages are among the targets of training programs supported by FNRI for food-poor provinces in the country based on the 2007 malnutrition survey, Yap said.

While Zenaida Narciso, FNRI chief science research specialist, said that the program aspires to empower the farmers and their wives in terms of nutrition and technology programs, to be able to have a livelihood.

“This program will also help increase consumption of products in line with nutrition program,” explained Narciso.

According to Narciso, in a span of three years, they will set up a Nutrition School On-the-Air to educate further the people in the area regarding proper nutrition.

They will also train them on squash canton production, and conduct training seminars for mothers on breastfeeding and complimentary feeding promotion.

Likewise, a physical activity for farmers through the Farmers’ Institution Training Service (FITS) will also be conducted to prevent them from liquor drinking and smoking.

“Evaluation on how much they learned from the program will be done yearly, until July 2013,” Narciso added.