Mississippi WIC State Agency WIC CIAO Project

Mississippi State Department of Health WIC Program’s project seeks to increase WIC enrollment and participation for target populations through partnership, outreach, and promotion activities and address language, cultural, and environmental barriers.

The project addresses the opportunity to strengthen WIC in Mississippi communities by addressing known barriers (i.e., misconceptions about eligibility requirements, transportation and costs to WIC clinics, language and cultural barriers, loss of time from work to apply and maintain benefits, dissatisfaction and lack of understanding of food packages, and difficulty redeeming benefits) and leveraging partnerships to improve visibility, participation, and enrollment for the WIC program.

This proposal is innovative through its use of data analysis, development and implementation of outreach materials that are culturally appropriate, establishment of new partnerships to reach WIC-eligible populations, and implementation of new approaches to making WIC visible in the communities served.

Lessons learned will be used to develop standard operating procedures to implement in policies for the WIC program, and to share with other WIC programs.