Michaëlle Jean, Chancellor of the University of Ottawa and UNESCO Special Envoy for Haiti, will launch on May 28 at The Plaza hotel in Port-au-Prince, a Summer University in community nutrition and agriculture of public health, through a partnership between the State University of Haiti (UEH), University of Ottawa and Laval University.

This Summer University, was designed to reinforce the acquisition of knowledge in nutritional science and support the education provided in Haitian universities. Better equipped, health professionals will face with more acute to the problems caused by hunger and malnutrition.

The food situation in Haiti has worsened after the earthquake of January 2010, while it was If all age groups are not spared, children are the primarily afflicted. The third of young people under five are chronically malnourished. The Summer University therefore comes answer a pressing need for specialist training in nutrition.

The two-week intensive training is designed not only to the student body and teaching staff of the UEHand of universities Quisqueya, Épiscopale, Notre Dame and Queensland, but also to the professionals from the Ministry of Public Health and Population and Ministry of Agriculture Natural Resources and Rural Development. Workers of NGOs working in the field of nutrition have also been invited to take part in this Summer University.

Michaëlle Jean, will also take advantage of her visit to Haiti, to meet and discuss ith the President Michel Martelly and Prime Minister, Laurent Lamothe, on the action plan of the new government and a number of issues, including the development of National History Park (Citadelle, Sans Souci, Ramiers), the management plan of campus of the UEH to Limonade, the literacy program and that of the teacher training.

Ms. Jean, will also meet several new ministers, including Marie Carmèle Rose Anne Auguste, the Minister Delegate to the Prime Minister for Human Right and the fight against extreme poverty, and Mario Dupuy, Minister of Culture, to discuss the strategy that their ministries intend to adopt for the country's recovery.

HL/ HaitiLibre