Worldwide—Technical Assistance to Strengthen Capabilities (TASC)

The Technical Assistance to Strengthen Capabilities Project (TASC) contributes to improved nutritional outcomes as part of the Technical Assistance for Nutrition (TAN) Programme funded by UK Aid. TASC works to improve coverage of multi-sectoral nutrition interventions to drive improvements in health and nutrition status. It aims to achieve this by strengthening the enabling environment for nutrition at the global and country levels, ultimately delivering policies and programmes that support the reduction of malnutrition.

To sustain and expand action on nutrition, TASC provides demand-driven technical assistance services in two components:

• Component 1: Assistance to governments in the SUN Movement and the SUN Movement Secretariat to catalyse efforts to scale up nutrition impact.
• Component 2: Assistance to the FCDO Nutrition Policy Unit and FCDO country offices to maximise the quality and effectiveness of their nutrition-related policy and programmes, to support evidence generation and lesson learning and to develop nutrition capacity.

TASC is led by DAI with NutritionWorks and Development Initiatives as consortium partners and is a follow-on to the Maximising the Quality of Scaling Up Nutrition Plus (MQSUN+) programme.

Sample Activities

• Analyse finance for nutrition actions (e.g. costing of multi-sectoral plans, budget analysis, and financial tracking)
• Support transition to the SUN Movement 3.0 Strategy (2021-2025)
• Conduct multi-country reviews of nutrition plans.
• Support SUN Movement’s learning agenda.
• Support FCDO on nutrition-related programme design and implementation (development of strategic cases; programme review; placement of consultants to boost technical capacity on nutrition; and other technical support)
• Facilitate knowledge management, learning, and capacity building (case studies, a COVID-19 tracker with monthly updates, various technical guidance notes, webinars for FCDO staff, and wider audiences).
• Support FCDO to measure the progress of its five-year Child Wasting Innovation Programme (previously called Progressing Action on Resilient Nutrition Systems through Innovation and Partnership) through a feedback mechanism survey covering nine countries in Africa and South Asia. The FAQ is available in English and French.

Select Results

• Developed four guidance notes commissioned by the FCDO detailing the latest evidence on how to improve nutrition programming and policies:
  1. Improving How to Reach Those Most-at-Risk of Malnutrition Guidance Note: Supports the identification of key population groups that are most nutritionally at-risk, the drivers of elevated malnutrition risk, and how to address the nutritional needs of at-risk groups
  2. Aligning Food System Activities with Healthier Diets for Low-Income Households Guidance Note Supports organisations and practitioners to design programmes and policies that enable the world’s most vulnerable people to eat more diverse, healthier diets, while also meeting climate and economic objectives.
  3. How to Promote Better Nutrition Through Social Assistance Guidance Note: Identifies how to use social protection programmes to target those most at risk of malnutrition, improve diets and address other nutrition determinants.
  4. Monitoring and Evaluation of Nutrition-Relevant Programmes A Guidance Note and associated indicator tool: Supports accurate measurement of programme outcomes and impacts for target populations. It explains how to use the data generated through M&E efforts to reflect the contribution made by nutrition programmes, and to improve them as necessary to increase effectiveness.
• Supported FCDO to identify, quantify, and understand its Official Development Assistance (ODA) spending on nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive programmes, as well as its performance against the Nutrition for Growth (N4G) commitments made in 2013.
• Supported the Sun Operationalisation Group through a change management process with clear actionable recommendations to implement SUN Movement Strategy 3.0.
• Assessed the effectiveness of MQSUN+ TA and identified best practices and lessons learned to inform the future design and provision of assistance: Case Studies; Synthesis Report; Guidance Note.
• Published a suite of case studies sharing good practices in areas key to fighting malnutrition in all its forms, including Coordination, Information Systems, Digital Solutions, Nutrition-sensitive interventions
• Developed a revised Joint Annual Assessment tool to support nutrition stakeholders in SUN countries to reflect on progress and bottlenecks and set country priorities for scaling up nutrition for the year ahead.