The government has funded the Ministry of Health to develop a national breastfeeding promotion campaign to improve breastfeeding rates and duration, especially for high-need groups, and Māori and Pacific peoples who have lower rates of breastfeeding than the non-Māori and non-Pacific population.
The Ministry commissioned scoping work to determine the barriers to breastfeeding, particularly for Māori and Pacific peoples, and how to address those barriers.
A comprehensive plan was produced from the scoping work to inform the design of a national breastfeeding promotion campaign. The plan recommends that the proposed campaign takes a comprehensive approach and uses a range of strategies and messages to improve support for mothers, and to promote and encourage supportive environments for breastfeeding. Work is progressing on the development of the campaign.
The overall goal of the campaign is to increase the proportion of infants being exclusively breastfed to six months and the proportion of infants partially breastfed beyond 6 months (this is consistent with World Health Organization breastfeeding recommendations).
Key Results
Key messages: Some key messages to be used as starting points in developing a campaign are that breastfeeding is a learned skill with common problems and solutions, and that it is everyone’s responsibility to support a mother to breastfeed, especially partners and other family/whānau and peers/other mothers.
Other key themes to consider are:
- breastfeeding is natural and normal
- breastfeeding is important for the baby’s wellbeing
- breastfeeding is associated with being a good mother
- breastfeeding is likely to become easier over time
- when established, breastfeeding is convenient and easy
- help and support from others makes a big difference
- most women breastfeed.