Advancing Breastfeeding: The Power of the Network

Friday, March 14, 2014

Chinese celebrity Ma Yili has over 50 million social media fans, and now she’s using her influence to promote breastfeeding in her home country, where only 28 percent of babies are exclusively breastfed. The “10m2 of Love” campaign Ma is publicizing includes a mobile app to help Chinese women locate and use public breastfeeding spaces.

From China to Pakistan, Venezuela and Viet Nam, countries are experimenting with new approaches to promote a life saving, natural practice under threat in the modern world.

At the global level, however, the breastfeeding community has yet to coalesce as an effective network. Today it’s in search of the strong leadership, unified agenda and contemporary message required to spark a social movement for breastfeeding in the 21st century.

Those are the findings of a recent UNICEF study seeking to understand why funding and political commitment for breastfeeding remains low, despite compelling evidence of its benefits.

Source: Impatient Optimists (link opens in a new window)

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