sions, is seeking to maintain a down- ward trend in malnutrition among young children. Regional activities in 1989 included an orientation workshop organized by vvi 10 tor francophone West African countries and the development of a regional training programme in food and nutrition surveillance for the Americas, in close co-operation with CAHO. At the international level, activities included the establishment of a net- work to develop and disseminate com- puter software for nutritional status assessments; methodological work on appropriate indicators; development of a distance-learning course on as- sessing nutritional status in house- hold surveys; and advocacy for food and nutritional surveillance for na- tional development. UNICEF has col- laborated with the World Banks So- cial Dimensions of Adjustment (SDA) programme at country and interna- tional level, and has strengthened its ties with the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme to incorporate nation-wide nutritional assessments in as many countries as possible. The Report of the International Conference on Food and Nutritional Surveillance for National Develop- ment, Mexico, recommended that countries establish multisectoral food and nutrition surveillance systems in order to provide decision makers with timely, accurate and easy-to-use data on the nutritional status of popula- tions and on trends in food availabili- ty and consumption. Infant feeding; One especially no- table event was die publication of a joint WHO/uxicEF statement on the !•-'special role of maternity services in protecting, promoting and support- ing breast-feeding. More than 35,000 copies of the statement were distrib- uted in English, French and Spanish. The statement includes a LO-point summary of what every maternity facility should do to support breast- feeding. An international survey of 35 major hospitals in developed countries found that 23 of them implemented at least nine of the 10 steps - a finding which confirmed the universal rele- vance of the statement. All 10 steps