By Clement Adeyi (Executive Editor), Abuja
Dr James Oloyede is a renowned and erudite Community and Public Health Nutrition specialist. In this interview, he tells tale of his journey in the profession as well as remarkable impacts in Osun State and Nigeria.
You are a seasoned Community and Public Health Nutrition expert and have made remarkable impacts in the health industry as a role model. What is your story of your career odyssey that upcoming professionals may learn from?
My journey into Community and Public Health and Nutrition started as far back as 1984 when I was given admission to study Public Health Superintendent at the then School of Health Technology, Ilesa, Osun State. Before then, my ambition was to study Pharmacy at the then University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife), but something happened along the line and I couldn’t resume with my mates to fulfil the ambition. But by virtue of providence, I later stumbled at people who were obtaining bank draft to buy the form for the School of Health Technology. With the support of one of my sisters, I bought the form and got the admission.
On the first day I resumed school, everything looked strange to me because I was a novice and didn’t understand what the course was all about. Many of us who got the admission were very young and within age 18. It was one Mr Ige (now late) who addressed us. While giving us some orientations, he said: “Some of you don’t know which course you have come for. This is a course for “wole-wole.” which means a course for people that would be engaging in dirty jobs.
I became discouraged. When I got back home, I said I was not going to do it. But my sister encouraged me. She said, “if you enter after one year, you can leave and go and do whatever you want to do. So I, I decided to return to the school. Within my first one year in the school, I found the course fascinating. I rejected it earlier because when I was growing up, I used to see people that did the course chasing people from dong hill. So, I felt that such course was not meant for me. I felt that how can a young man be doing such a job? But I never knew that things had changed.
When I later realized, I started to develop interest in the course.
In my year two (it was a three-year course), I got admission to the university and wanted to go. But my sister advised me again with wisdom that since I had only one year more to finish the Community and Public Health and Nutrition programme, I should be patient and complete it. She said: “If you obtain this certificate, you can still go for direct entry admission later.” So, I waited and finished the programme. That was how my journey started in the Public Health as a Public Health Superintendent. Immediately, I was posted to the Institute of Occupational Health at the Secretariat in the then Oyo State.
How did you later attain your career height?
Despite initial stress and challenges, I thank God that I was able to rise from that lower level of a Public Health Superintendent. After the training, I was confirmed and later got approval to study for a PhD at the Public Health level. Although I started my career as a public superintendent, I later became a nutritionist and eventually a public health specialist towards the end of my twilight in career. This spanned a period of 35 years in public service.
What challenges did you face in your career journey and how were you able to overcome them?
There were moments of discouragement and moments that one would want to give up. There were moments one felt that things weren’t working as expected. But resilience, fortitude, focus and what one wants to become in life and more importantly how one wants one’s life to impact the community fired my passion. I remember the several times my lecturers asked me to stay back and join the teaching profession in the university and I resisted because I believe that I belong to the community and preferred to impact the community with my training. In fact, they thought that I had wasted their first class because I made a first class in my first degree. I reasoned that if I went into teaching, how would I implement the outcome of all the studies and researches I had done in the university? So, I remain focused till I start making remarkable marks in the health profession.
What remarkable impacts did you made in your state, Osun, since you became a health and nutrition professional?
Before I found myself in the profession, I had made up my mind that I would never quit until I made a mark in my state. In fact, I told myself that I was not going to quit until I changed the nutrition narrative on my state.
Now, I’m very grateful to God that with the team that I work with throughout my career in public service, we have been able to make remarkable marks. I remember in 1993 when the first survey was done by triple CD. The stunting rate in Osun State then was about 50%. In fact, one out of every two children was stunted by the time I was leaving. But with my professional impact, the percentage was just a little over 20% by the time I left the public sector. My team and I were able to reduce stunting among children.
We also improved exclusive breastfeeding programme in the state. Quite a number of other health programmes also took place. I remember also in 2004 when we received a letter from the Federal Ministry of Budget and Planning to introduce a State Committee on Food and Nutrition. To the glory of God, the committee really helped to advance the cause of food and nutrition in Osun State.
We also had a Demonstration Farm and went to every local government to set up the committee for the programme. We also did solar training, we did post harvest storage of food to ensure food security in the state.
In 2006 when school feeding programme was about to start, Osun State was selected as one of the 12 pioneer states in Nigeria. That was in the days of Governor Olagunsoye Oyinlola. Two committees were set up. They included Steering and Evaluation committees. I made valuable contributions to the take off of the projects to ensure that we do not just put any kind of food on the table, but the quality of food that could supply at least one third (1/3) of the daily nutrient requirements for the children of that age group.
We went to do market survey. We standardized the spoons to scoop the food. We trained the cooks, we dewormed the children. We ensured that there were school kitchens. Food was prepared in schools, not from home. This was to enable the school management committee oversee the preparation and quality of the foods.
It also helped the children to take delight in the foods they were eating. We also helped schools to create gardens within their schools from where vegetable and other things could be sourced to support the school feeding programme.
I also contributed a lot to various policies and regulations on food and nutrition in the state. When we were to start the social protection policy in the state, I was a part of the team. The strategic plan for nutrition in the state was the first ever. I led the technical team with the support of our UN partner, UNICEF. We gave a strong structure to nutrition in every local government. We saw focus in well trained and skilled staff to implement the programme. We also worked with other MDAs to also implement nutrition programme.
In view of your potentialities in driving public health, especially nutrition programmes, was Osun State able to win any foreign grant to advance the cause?
In 2018, Osun State was able to win about 20 million US dollar grant for saving one million lives because of high coverage of vitamin A and some other things that were done. Throughout the period, from 2007 Osun started Child Week, which was adopted nationally and christened Maternal Labour and Child Health. Since then and throughout my stay, we ensured that at least twice in a year, the week was celebrated, which, of course, delivered high impact and low cost intervention to improve the nutrition of mother and child. Gradually, other interventions were added to improve maternal health as well as child survival.
What challenges did you face and how were you able to overcome them to encourage the younger ones who consider the career as a difficult terrain?
One of the greatest challenges I faced as a young professional was the issue of identity because over time, nutrition was not accorded a recognisable identity as it was considered to be an appendage of the health sector.
More often than not, when allocations were done or priority were given within the health sector, nutrition usually came last and given least attention. As a young officer, I found this very frustrating, because one had to work and navigate an environment that was well structured but disproportionate to nutrition, whereas other components of health were well prioritized, while nutrition was not because it was evolving as at the time I assumed the mantle of leadership of nutrition.
How I overcame challenges? There were so many strategies I used. One, I had to develop myself. I was able to do that because I had managers, supervisors and bosses who believed so much in me and trusted me. They gave me wings to fly and to exhibit the talent and the gifts that I had, especially the knowledge of nutrition that I have. Without any hesitation, they created a platform for me to be heard. So, I became so vocal. I was not restrained from speaking. This credit goes to every director I had worked with before I also became a director. They’re not people that caged subordinates under them.
I like to commend Dr Adeyeye Adeoluwa of blessed memory now. He was the first director of Primary Health Care in Osun State. I need to also thank Dr Adelasoye, who was also Director of Primary Health care and later became permanent secretary before he retired. I thank Doctor Ajao who gave me wings to fly. He was also a director of Primary Health care. I need to thank Doctor Oguniyi too who was also Director of Primary Health care after Doctor Ajao left and eventually became Executive Secretary of Primary Health Care Board, under whose leadership I became a director. I was first a director for Community Health Service and Education before the Department of Nutrition and Education was created.
You were able to rise to the pinnacle of your career in the public service. How were you able to attain the feat as well as all the remarkable impacts you made?
The power of self development cannot be underestimated. I was granted an opportunity for self development right within the system and I did. I thank the system. I got approval to study, including my PhD and because knowledge is power, you can speak to facts and figures and able to convince people. The advocacy was robust because it was data- driven.
So because of self development, I can do a lot of analysis. I can make indepth researches and defend them. I can make inference from trends and convince policy makers that nutrition needs to be heard. That was how it eventually became a department. I was the first to be director of two departments at the board within a space of one year; first as a Director for Community Health and Education Services, after few months when the department was split into two and I became the pioneer Director of Nutrition and Education in the State Primary Health Board of Osun State.
In the state primary care board, there was no Department of Nutrition initially. But I thank God that I was able to pioneer the department.
Can you say that Osun benefitted from your self development passion?
The Department of Nutrition in Nigeria had emerged from Osun State Primary Health Care Board, even before the Federal Government eventually created the Department of Nutrition at the Federal Ministry of Work and Social Development. That was part of what happened through my self development. When you develop yourself, even when you are faced with challenges and frustration, you can’t give up. If you prepare yourself ahead, when opportunity comes, you’ll be tailor- made and ready to face and overcome challenges. You just fit in, but when you don’t develop yourself today and demand is made of you tomorrow, then there’s no way you can fit in. So I believe that I was able to navigate those challenges because of the opportunities my bosses gave me as well as my passion for self development.
What is your message to the upcoming professionals?
I want to encourage them that even if they are not given opportunity now, they should continue to develop themselves ahead so that whenever the opportunity is created, they would stand the chance to fit in. But if because they’re not given space now and they rest on their oars, by the time the space is created, somebody from somewhere who had prepared himself ahead would take the chance place and they remain stagnated.
Apart from the remarkable impact you have made so far in your career spanning 35 years in public service, what efforts did you make in human capacity development to groom more professionals that could take over from you in the near future?
As a young officer, I contributed to the training of the first set of Higher National Diploma (HND) students of Environmental Health at the College of Health Technology, Ilesa, Osun State. Also, there was a new course that was introduced then and nobody was found able to teach it. But because of self development, I had already been equipped with the skills and capacity to teach the course. So, there was no need for the system to source for an external lecturer. I therefore volunteered to teach the course and the students passed it exceedingly well. I also undertook teaching Nutrition at various levels of the first set of HND students that were accredited by the MBTE so that they could qualify for the National Youth Service Corps programme. Those that I trained have since become professionals in their own class.
Did you also contribute in any way to policy development as a part of efforts to grow the public health and nutrition programme in the state?
Yes, indeed. I contributed a lot to various policy developments within the health sector. One of them is the social protection policy. I represented the Minister of Health in that committee and nutrition cluster in particular. That was how nutrition became a component of social welfare in the state, apart from other health components that were available then.
I also participated actively and represented the ministry in the 10-year strategic development plan for Osun State. The state has a 10-year development agenda in which I was instrumental as well as various midterm expenditure frameworks for the state. I was also a member of the board of the health sector that prepared it for the state then.
In the nutrition sector, I was able to lead the development strategies – the five years strategic plan for nutrition and the multi-sectoral plan which goes beyond the Ministry of Health, including other ministries, departments and agencies.
As a result of this, we were able to reduce the incidences of malnutrition in Osun State. When the state was created in 1991, it had one of the highest stunting rates in Nigeria, especially in the Southwest, with an average of one out of two children stunted. But in 1993 when I was leaving the saddle, the stunting rate dropped to about 20 something percent, despite all the economic hardship and other challenges.
We were able to reach the milestone because of my contribution to the take off of our national homegrown and school feeding health programme by the Federal Government. Osun was one of the states selected for the programme.
I was a part of the pioneer team that started the project till few years to my retirement when I replaced myself after I became became a director.
As a professional, I also contributed immensely at both sub-national and national levels to the Nutrition Society of Nigeria by drafting strategic plans of the society, doing presentations, involving in symposiums and participating in national conferences. Owing to the contributions, I was awarded a fellow of the society about three years ago.
In 2018, due to our contributions to the nutrition sector, my team and I were able to win about 20 million US dollars for saving one million lives. With this feat, nutrition was one of the indicators that made Osun come second at the national level in nutrition programmes. We won the award for the state government to further improve the health sector.
As a professional team leader, what other specific roles did your team play in Osun State’s health and nutrition programme?
By the time I was leaving in 2019, Osun State had the highest rate of coverage of vitamin A. It also has the highest coverage of exclusive breastfeeding. It was a feat performed by the team that I led through a good team spirit. We worked together in all the 30 local government areas of the state and area offices. The members of the team were well focused and very fantastic in the discharge of their duties. They are highly skilled and ready to learn. We ran the race together to achieve all that we were able to achieve for the state as well as the milestone that I was able to reach both at the state and national levels in the public service.
