Programs projects and lessons: States and Territories

Details and links (where available) of programs and projects in the Northern Territory of relevance to the nutritional health of Indigenous peoples are provided here.

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Northern Territory

Major Indigenous

Project name: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Guide to Healthy Eating
Project summary: The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Guide to Healthy Eating is a tool to provide information about the amounts and kind of food that people need to eat each day to be healthy. The guide shows how much food is required everyday from each food group for good nutrition and health. It explains how healthy eating throughout life can help reduce the risk of health problems later in life such as  type 2 diabetes, heart disease, cancer and obesity. The foods included in the guide are those that can be found at the store as well as some local bush and seafood's. This flyer provides information and ideas on how to put messages from the ATSI Guide to Healthy Eating into practice. The educators resource in the form of a flip chart has been designed to assist health professionals educate others about eating for good health.
View project poster (PDF - 1.8MB - large file warning!)
View project flyer (PDF - 2MB - large file warning)
View educator's resource (PDF - 2.7MB - large file warning!)
View website: Northern Territory Government

Project name: 'Growth assessment and action' (GAA) program
Project summary: The aim of the Northern Territory Government's Growth Assessment and Action (GAA) program is to improve the growth and nutritional status of children 0-5 years living in remote communities. The program has been operating in the Northern Territory for 10 years and has gradually been applied to other States across the country. GAA involves regular monitoring of growth and implementation of early action if growth falters. The main objectives of the GAA involve timely and accurate growth and anemia monitoring of individual children, appropriate and timely intervention of growth faltering, and reporting nutritional status, including anemia prevalence at community, district and territory level. The Northern Territory GAA report provides population level information on the growth status of Indigenous children under five in remote communities across the NT. The report includes details of the program coverage, reporting the number of children measured compared with the number of resident children. The report also provides rates of stunting, wasting, underweight and anemia for the whole NT and by broad geographical regions.
View resource: Facilitator training package/implementation manual (PDF - 100KB)
View information: Northern Territory GAA report , GAA data collection 2006 (PDF - 48KB)
View website: Northern Territory Government Department of Health and Community Services
Contact: Child Health Nutritionist
Ph. (08) 8922 7810

Project name: Healthy Weight Program
Project summary: Healthy Weight Program is a group based, healthy lifestyle education resource package designed especially for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults. It is adapted from the Queensland program of the same name. Participants are encouraged to adopt a healthy lifestyle through improved nutrition choices and practices and increased physical activity. The Healthy Weight Program consists of 12 workshops that can be combined in a variety of ways to suit community and local group needs. The workshops address various lifestyle and personal issues, including healthy eating, physical activity, self esteem and behaviour change. The program addresses life skills enhancement through practical sessions on cooking, shopping, budgeting and physical activity. A facilitators training program is offered to generalist health staff including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health workers, Community Health Services staff and other non-government health services.
Contact: TE Nutrition Coordinator
Ph: (08) 8922 8723

Project name: Infant Feeding Guidelines
Project summary: The purpose of the Infant Feeding Guidelines is to assist all health staff in the Northern Territory (NT) to provide appropriate and consistent nutrition advice and support to families and caregivers about feeding infants. These are population guidelines and apply to all healthy, term (greater than thirty-seven weeks gestation) infants. The overriding message of the guidelines, which is in line with current NHMRC recommendation, is to support and promote exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of life, and to commence appropriate complementary feeding at about 6 months of age, with continued breastfeeding throughout the first year of life and beyond, as long as mutually desired. Overall the document promotes that improving infant feeding practices is one of the most cost-effective public health interventions.
View information: Northern Territory infant feeding guidelines, 2005 (PDF - 115KB)
View website: Northern Territory Government, Department of Health and Community Services
Contact: Child Health Nutritionist
Ph: (08) 8922 7810

Project name: Living Strong: A Healthy Lifestyle Program for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Communities
Project summary: Living Strong is a group based, healthy lifestyle education program (formerly known as healthy weight program) designed especially for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults. Participants are encouraged to adopt a healthy lifestyle through improved nutrition choices and practices and increased physical activity. The Living Strong program consists of 12 workshops that can be combined in a variety of ways to suit community and local group needs. The workshops address various lifestyle and personal issues, including healthy eating, physical activity, self esteem and behaviour change. The program addresses life skills enhancement through practical sessions on cooking, shopping, budgeting and physical activity. Optional health screenings are also included. A five-day facilitators training program is offered to generalist health staff including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health workers, Community Health Services staff and other non-government health services.
Contact: TE Nutrition Coordinator
Ph: (08) 8922 8723



Project name: Market Basket Survey
Project summary: The Northern Territory Market Basket Survey was developed to enable those with an interest in food supply in remote communities to monitor food cost, availability, variety and quality in remote community stores. It enables information to be collected on particular aspects, such as:

  • store management,
  • employment of Aboriginal people,
  • existence of a store nutrition policy,
  • community development initiatives by the store (sponsorship, donations, nutrition promotions and store worker training).


View information: Market basket surveys of remote community stores in the Northern Territory, April - June 2006 (PDF - 698KB)
View information: Northern Territory Government , Department of Health and Community Services
Northern Territory Government, Department of Health and Community Services
Contact: Carrie Turner, Project Officer, Nutrition and Physical Activity, Department of Health and Community services
Ph: (08) 8985 80917

Project name: Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara ( NPY) Nutrition program
Project summary: This program provides educational workshops, family work and store development work in the NPY lands (cross border region of SA, WA and NT).
View information: Department of Families, Housing Community Services and Indigenous Affairs
View website: Australian Government, Department of Families, Housing Community Services and Indigenous Affairs
Contact: Liza Balmer
Ph: (08) 89582345
Email: nutritionmanager@npywc.org.au

Project name: Strong Women, Strong Babies, Strong Culture
Project summary: The Strong women, strong babies, strong culture program promotes improvement in the health of Aboriginal women and their babies.
The program aims to:

  • Improve the health and well being of all mothers and their newborn babies.
  • Strengthen the family unit and help bring back cultural practices.
  • Prevent and promote early intervention of lifestyle illness and disease before, during and following pregnancy.
  • Provide a healthier community for future generations.

The program recognises the traditional cultural approaches to parenting and lifestyle, supporting pregnant Aboriginal women and their babies through better diet, education and ante natal care, with the aim of increasing the birth weight of babies and improving early childhood development. The program relies on and supports senior women in participating communities to provide direct support to pregnant women and their families. The senior women encourage attendance at antenatal care clinics and provide advice on nutrition. Connections and support for involvement in cultural events are an important part of the program. This particular program is one that has a strong community development focus and potentially major health benefits to Aboriginal people. This has a long term outlook with lasting benefits rather than only treating immediate health problems.
View information: St John of God Health Care
View website: St John of God Health Care
Contact: : Marlene Liddle
Ph: (08) 8922 7766

Project name: Tummy Rumbles
This booklet has been produced to assist those working in remote Aboriginal communities who are providing meals for school children. The resource supports the notion that food and nutrition are important for school children to ensure they are healthy and able to learn effectively. In addition to providing information on nutrition, this booklet contains various meal ideas that are easy to prepare.
View resource: Tummy Rumbles (HTML))
View website: Northern Territory Department of Health and Community Services

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Other Indigenous

Project name: Aboriginal Health and Families - a five year framework for action
Project summary: This framework focuses on the delivery of a set of balanced core services targeted at the most important periods and transition points in Territorian's lives. It is broken into two complementary sections. The first section relates to significant reform to the health and family well being service platform in the NT, while the second section covers reform to the quality and functioning of the health and family well being system.
View information: Northern Territory Government, Department of Health and Community Services
Northern Territory Government, Department of Health and Community Services

Project name: Congress Alukura
Project summary: Congress Alukura is a women's health and birthing centre developed in the 1980s to address the concerns of Aboriginal women in Central Australia. Their services include the provision of culturally appropriate antenatal, intrapartum, postnatal and women's health care through their midwifery led Maternity Service and Women's Health Clinic.
View website: Central Australian Aboriginal Congress Inc.
Contact: 9 Percy Crt, Alice Springs
Ph: (08) 8953 2727

Project name: Lajamanu Council, Katherine West Health Board - Lajamanu Healthy Takeaway
Project summary: This project aimed to promote healthy food options in the Lajamanu community through culturally accepted projects and education. Healthy takeaway foods were introduced to the Community Food Store and Takeaway.
Other projects introduced through Store include: • “Healthy Dish” • “Popcorn Promotion” • “Healthy School Lunch Pack”.
Contact: Contact: Courtney Cramp
Ph: (08) 89719322
Email: Courtney.cramp@kwhb.com.au

Project name: Matharkal Homelands Resource Centre, Mapuru Food Cooperative
Project summary: Provides nutritious food for a remote Eastern Arnhemland community. The Cooperative has been operating for 6 years (since 2002), giving the local population control of the food supply and enable the school's teacher and students to develop a curriculum based on planning and running a cooperative to develop literacy, numeracy, health and enterprise understandings and skills. The Cooperative enables Mapuru residents to live on their ancestral estates where more than half the food consumed is collected from the surrounding land.
View website: Arnhem Weavers
Contact: Email: john.greatorex@cdu.edu.au

Project name: Nyirranggulung Nutrition Project
Project summary: The name 'Nyirranggulung Nutrition Project' incorporates a number of projects in the East Katherine area that aim to secure long term improvements in nutrition in communities by increasing the availability of affordable, nutritious food. Such programs include a Women's Centre school meals program, a Community Stores Program and accessible nutrition advice provided through a nutritionist.
View information: Review of the Nyirranggulung Nutrition Project (PDF - 599KB)
View information: Review of the Nyirranggulung Nutrition Project Appendices (PDF - 599KB)
Contact: Alison Edwards
Ph (08) 8941 5145
Email: fhf@hollows.org

Project name: Remote Meals on Wheels Training Package
Project summary: This is an education package for remote Indigenous people working on home and Community care programs or other services requiring food preparation.
Contact: TE Nutrition Coordinator
Ph: (08) 8922 8723

Project name: Waltja Childcare Nutrition Projects
Project summary: This project aims to assist the planning and development of a sustainable community based nutrition program which meets the communities' needs and priorities. The project also aims to establish local and regional networks of support for community nutrition issues.
Contact:
Ph: (08) 8953 4488
Email admin@waltja.org.au

Project name: Waltja's APY Mother's and Children's program
Project summary: Waltja is supporting the establishment of 11 new childcare services across Far North South Australia. Nutrition is a key element of training and delivery. Daily programs are centred around nutrition and lifestyle issues, including safe handling and preparation of food, storage and purchasing, balanced diets and looking after young mothers and babies.
Contact:
Ph: (08) 89534488
Email: admin@waltja.org.au

Project name: Yirrkala Active Cooking
Project summary: This initiative supports the Yolngu young people of Yirrkala Community in East Arnhem Land . It is a beach cooking and physical activity program run by Yirrkala Sport and Recreation in partnership with the Department of Health and Community Services . The program run s weekly, after school and during school holidays. The goal is to provide regular opportunities for Yolngu young people to learn about food preparation and to have a fun experience cooking and being physically active.
Contact: East Arnhem Nutrition and Physical Activity Officer
Ph: (08) 89 87 0395

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General

Project name: Go for 2 and 5 ®
Project summary: In April 2005, the Department of Health and Community Services launched a Northern Territory wide campaign to promote the increased consumption of fruit and vegetables. With a tag line of “Go for 2 & 5 ® ”, Territorians are encouraged to increase their consumption to 2 serves of fruit and 5 serves of vegetables per day, in line with the Australian Dietary Guidelines. A range of activities has been held in all regions of the Territory, including cooking demonstrations, educational talks, sharing of policy development ideas, and visits to schools and communities by the 'Veggie Man' (spokesperson for the campaign).
View information: Northern Territory Government, Department of Human and Community Services
View website: Northern Territory Government, Department of Health and Community Services

Project name: Nutrition And Physical Activity Program
Project summary: The Nutrition And Physical Activity Program's vision is ‘improved nutritional status and health of Territorians' and its work is guided by the Nutrition and Physical Activity Action Plan 2007-2012. The program's priority areas of action are maternal and child nutrition, nutrition during pregnancy and breastfeeding,  nutrition of children under five years, nutrition of school aged children, food supply, availability, affordability and adequate consumption of core foods in remote communities, commercial and non-commercial food services, fruit and vegetable consumption, participation in regular physical activity, healthy weight for all, prevention and management of Chronic Disease in remote areas, the focus is on the promotion of healthy lifestyle and management of people with nutrition related conditions. In urban areas, services also include individual and group consultations through community care centres.
View website: Northern Territory Government, Department of Human and Community Services
View website: Department of Health and Community Services, Northern Territory Government

Project name: Well Baby Clinic
Project summary: The Well Baby Clinic provides growth and weight development checks, breast feeding support, information on introducing solid foods, immunisation and hearing check referrals.
Contact info: Congress Clinic, 25 Gap Road , ph: (08) 8951 4444, fax: (08) 8953 0350
View website: Central Australian Aboriginal Congress (CAAC)

Project name: Tennant Creek Primary School – Healthy Food Happy Kids
Project summary: The project provides nutritious food to the children and staff at minimal cost with breakfast, recess and a cooked lunch. It is staffed by a local Aboriginal organisation with flexible payment options for parents.
Contact: Heidi Preston
Ph: 89624422

Project name: Hunting for Health Challenge
Project summary: The NT Hunting for Health Challenge Lesson Pack consists of a variety of lesson plans designed for the various year levels within primary school. Each focuses on making healthy food choices and taking regular physical activity as a means of preventing lifestyle diseases such as Diabetes Type II, heart disease and high blood pressure in later life.
View information: The NT Hunting for Health Challenge Lesson Pack (HTML)
Contact: Erica Reeve, Childhood Healthy Weight Project Officer
Email: Erica.reeve@heartfoundation.com.au
Ph: (08) 89822702

Project name: Childhood Healthy Weight Project
Project summary: The project aims to provide an education and intervention support program for carers and teachers of school aged children, focusing on creches, childcare centres, primary schools and after hours school locations. The Project is monitored by a Steering Committee, made up of representatives from Department of Health and Community Services (DHCS), National Heart Foundation (NHF), Department of Employment, Education and Training (DEET) and the Catholic Education Office. The project officer position is based at the NHF.
Contact: Erica Reeve, Childhood Healthy Weight Project Officer
Email: Erica.reeve@heartfoundation.com.au
Ph: (08) 89822702

Project name: Tastes Good, Is Good
Project summary: This recipe book resulted from a competition conducted by the Department of Health and Community Services Nutrition and Physical Activity Unit. Contestants from Aboriginal communities were asked to send in a variety of recipes that would promote healthy eating in their community. Recipes needed to be: low in fat; low in salt; high in vegetables and/or fruit; tasty; made from readily available ingredients; relatively easy to make; and use readily available equipment.
Resource not available at this time
View website: Department of Health and Community Services, Northern Territory Government

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Last updated: 29 October 2008