In Ethiopia, poor infant and young child feeding practices and low household dietary diversity remain widespread. The government has adopted the National Nutrition Programme that emphasizes the need for multisectoral collaboration to effectively deliver nutrition-sensitive and nutrition-specific interventions. The Sustainable Undernutrition Reduction in Ethiopia (SURE) program is one such government-led initiative that will be implemented jointly by the health and agriculture sectors across 150 districts in Ethiopia. Prior to the design of the SURE program, this formative research study was conducted to understand how the governance structure and linkages between health and agriculture sectors at local levels can support the implementation of program activities. The data were collected from eight districts in Ethiopia using 16 key informant interviews and eight focus group discussions conducted with district and community-level focal persons for nutrition including health and agriculture extension workers. A framework analysis approach was used to analyze data.
Results of the study reveal the following facts. First, few respondents were aware of the National Nutrition Programme or of their own roles within the multi-sectoral coordination mechanism outlined by the government to deliver nutritional programs and services. Second, lack of knowledge or commitment to nutrition, lack of resources, and presence of competing priorities within individual sectors were identified as barriers to effective coordination between health and agriculture sectors. Third, a strong central commitment to nutrition increased involvement of other partners in nutrition and the presence of community development workers such as health and agriculture extension workers were identified as facilitators of effective coordination.
In conclusion, federal guidelines to implement the Ethiopian National Nutrition Programme have yet to be translated to district or community level administrative structures. Sustained political commitment and provision of resources will be necessary to achieve effective inter-sectoral collaboration to deliver nutritional services. The health and agriculture extension platforms may be used to link interventions for sustained nutrition impact.

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Ayana, G., Hailu, T., Kuche, D. et al. Linkages between health and agriculture sectors in Ethiopia: a formative research study exploring barriers, facilitators and opportunities for local level coordination to deliver nutritional programmes and services. BMC Nutr 3, 69 (2017). ttps://doi.org/10.1186/s40795-017-0189-4)//

This dataset is produced by a formative research study conducted in August 2015 in Tigray, Amhara, Oromiya, and SNNPR regions. The dataset captures information on demographic characteristics of study participants such as age, region, gender, agriculture sector, health sector, number of key informative interviews, and focus group discussions. The dataset also provides information on facilitators of collaboration included the existence of strong local government commitment to nutrition and the presence of community networks and on barriers of effective coordination included poor awareness of the nutrition problem or of mandated coordination structures, weak political commitment, competing priorities, and lack of resources.
The data was collected using 16 key informant interviews (KIIs) at the Woreda level and 8 focus group discussions (FGDs) at the kebele level. Participants were asked about the existing functionality of local level multi-sectoral coordination and about barriers, facilitators, and future opportunities for effective multi-sectoral coordination to deliver integrated nutrition services to the community. The number of interviews and focus group discussions depended upon reaching a theoretical saturation point in each category of active and inactive districts and kebeles. A Framework analysis approach was used to analyze collected qualitative data.

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