Baby-Friendly Spaces Regina

What are baby-friendly spaces?

Baby-friendly spaces are public places that allow families to immediately respond to their children‘s hunger cues by comfortably and safely feeding in the way that works for them. Baby-Friendly Spaces Regina strives to normalize feeding infants and children in public to achieve better holistic health and quality of life for families and communities.

Why does our community need baby-friendly spaces?

To increase community belonging, it’s crucial to support families feeding their children in public. Negative reactions and stigma can make parents uncomfortable, affecting their ability to respond to their child’s hunger promptly. This can lead to emotional and physical strain, feelings of isolation, and pressure to change their feeding method. Empowering families to feed their children as needed increases their sense of belonging, safety, and reduces fear. Programs like Baby-Friendly Spaces improve parent and child quality of life, mental well-being, health, relationships, and breastfeeding success.

To honour the rights of parents and children

The Federal Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canada Human Rights Commission, and the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission all recognize that feeding a child and breast/chestfeeding are human rights. It is discriminatory to prevent a parent/caregiver from feeding a child. It is not acceptable to ask them to cover up either – some babies do not like to eat while being covered up. Infants and children have a right to eat.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there are many benefits of responding to infant and child hunger cues such as:

The development of healthy food preferences
Prevention of undernutrition
Improved psycho-emotional and cognitive development
Many opportunities for attachment and bonding

Allowing families to breast/chestfeed in public contributes to a better environment as it requires no production, packaging or waste disposal to do so.

Establishments that provide a baby-friendly space for families to comfortably feed their children have been shown to experience the following benefits:

Improved customer service
Attracting a new customer base
Longer customer stays
Increased publicity

Baby-friendly spaces are everyone’s business.

Our invitation to you

We invite you to join our goal of supporting families to feed any way and anywhere for the health of our children and their parents. Supporting them is also one way you can help increase food security in our community. All businesses, organizations and public places are welcome to participate!

Want to join in? It is easy to make your place baby-friendly and we can help! Start by welcoming families to feed their children anytime, anywhere, and in any way they choose to in your establishment. If space allows, you can also create a clean and comfortable space for families to use if they wish for a quieter, more private place to feed their child.

Here are some resources to help you get started:

– A toolkit with tips and strategies to get you started!
– A short informational video you and your staff can use to learn more.

Once you have created your baby-friendly space, you may wish to email us to request a decal to display in your establishment to show your support to your clients.

Looking for ideas? Here are some Baby-Friendly Spaces champions in our community!

If you can answer ‘yes’ to all of these questions, congratulations, you are a Baby-Friendly Space!

Your staff support and understand the importance of feeding any way and anywhere and do not ask breastfeeding caregivers to cover up or use designated spaces if they do not wish to do so.
Your staff understand the importance of welcoming families and helping to make them comfortable to feed their infants and children at your establishment. They can appropriately address concerned patrons who are uncomfortable with families feeding in public or inappropriate comments regarding breastfeeding.
If possible, a clean, quiet and comfortable space (that is not a washroom) is available for any family to feed their infant or child or to express milk, as requested.
The universal breastfeeding symbol is posted in a highly visible place at your establishment. Decals can be requested at babyfriendlyspaces@saskhealthauthority.ca
Any of your staff returning from parental leave are supported to continue providing human milk to their child if they wish to do so.

Baby-Friendly Spaces Regina exists through partnerships between Regina communities, businesses, community-based organizations, and the Saskatchewan Health Authority. Baby-Friendly Spaces initiatives aim to support all families to be able to respond to their children’s hunger cues comfortably while in public. Also through this program, participating businesses and organizations let families know that they support families feeding their children any way, anytime and anywhere.

For more information, check out the resources below or contact us at: babyfriendlyspaces@saskhealthauthority.ca.

For More Information:

Pregnancy, Parenting and the Workplace: What Employees and Employers Need to Know
Breastfeeding Committee for Saskatchewan
Breastfeeding Committee for Canada
Ellyn Satter Institute – Raise a healthy child who is a joy to feed
Health Canada’s Breastfeeding Your Baby
Moms and Kids Health Saskatchewan – Saskatchewan Health Authority
Saskatchewan Health Authority Baby-Friendly Spaces Toolkit

1. DiSantis, K.I., Hodges, E.A., Johnson, S.L., & Fisher, J.O. (2011)
The role of responsive feeding in overweight during infancy and toddlerhood: A systematic review. International Journal of Obesity, 35: 480-492.

2. Dozio E, Le Roch K, Bizouerne C. (2020)
Baby friendly spaces: an intervention for pregnant and lactating women and their infants in Cameroon. Intervention 2020;18:78-84.

3. Ellyn Satter Institute (2023)
Eating competence. [online]. Available at: https://www.ellynsatterinstitute.org/satter-eating-competence-model/

4. Grant, A., Pell, B., Copeland, L., Brown, A., Ellis, R., Morris, D., Williams, D. & Phillips, R. (Year)
Views and experience of breastfeeding in public: A qualitative systematic review. https://doi.org/10.1111/mcn.13407

5. Hirani, S. A., & Ahmadi, R. (2022)
Barriers and strategies for successful implementation of baby-friendly hospital initiative: A scoping review. Clinical Lactation, 13 (3). http://dx.doi.org/10.1891/CL-2022-0003

6. Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission (2006)
Parenting, Pregnancy and the Workplace: What Employees and Employers need to know. p. 44. Accessed online Aug 2023. Available at: https://saskatchewanhumanrights.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/PPW_Imposition.pdf

7. United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (2023)
Nurturing Young Children Through Responsive Feeding. [online]. Available at: https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/367886/9789240070301-eng.pdf

* Photography provided by Emilia Wolfmueller with As You Are Photography

* As visitors on this land, we would like to acknowledge that we are on the Traditional Treaty 4 Territory and the original lands of the Cree, Saulteaux, Dakota, Nakota, Lakota, and the homeland of the Métis. It is a privilege to be able to come together to build culturally sensitive and strong authentic relationships with the communities we serve. We come with respect for the land we are on, and for the people who have lived here before us. We will continue to support and encourage Baby Friendly Spaces for all those who reside here on these traditional lands and work alongside the original land holders.