Bear Brand Laki Sa Gatas: Advocating good nutrition

Proper nutrition plays a significant role in the country’s development. A healthy citizenry means a healthy nation.

This is the reason why Bear Brand has initiated a program that helps inculcate to Filipinos the relevance of milk drinking in achieving proper nutrition.

The advocacy campaign is called Laki Sa Gatas and was launched in 2006. Here, Bear Brand visits hundreds of public elementary schools from different regions nationwide to educate students, parents, and teachers on the importance of drinking milk in ensuring proper nutrition.

“The alarming decrease in milk consumption rate in recent years—together with the rampant cases of malnutrition among Filipino children—have made us realize the need to take on this cause,” explains Eugene David, Business Executive Manager for Dairy Health and Nutrition Solutions of Nestle Philippines, Inc. (NPI), the maker of Bear Brand.

Together with the Nutrition Foundation of the Philippines (NFP), Laki Sa Gatas develops educational materials to teach parents how to make the right food choices for their families. One of the most affordable and convenient ways to do this is by providing their children with at least two glasses of milk everyday.

Teachers who participate in Laki Sa Gatas are lectured on identifying and addressing malnutrition cases among their students, while the kids are treated to fun activities and educated on the value of good health and proper nutrition.

LAKI Laki Sa Gatas has successfully visited more than 1,600 schools nationwide. It has reached out to 714,000 students, 436,000 mothers, and 7,200 public school teachers.

Some of the schools participated in the program are located in the Greater Manila Area and major provinces like Batangas, La Union, Naga, Pampanga, Bulacan, Cebu, Davao, Bacolod, IloIlo, and Cagayan de Oro.

Now on its third year, Laki Sa Gatas intends to make the campaign bigger by going to more schools with its improved program that addresses the declining nutritional status based on the 2003 National Nutrition Survey done by the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI-DOST) and encouraging the rest of the country to get back to the habit of milk drinking.