<![CDATA[Nutritional problems among children under five years of age remain a significant public health challenge in Indonesia. One of the factors influencing the nutritional status of toddlers is the mother's level of nutritional knowledge. Community empowerment-based nutrition education is a strategy that can enhance mothers' understanding through the active involvement of community health volunteers and local communities. This study aimed to determine the effect of community empowerment-based nutrition education on the nutritional knowledge of mothers with toddlers in Bunga Eja Village, Makassar City. A pre-experimental study with a one-group pretest–posttest design was conducted from April 1 to April 30, 2026. The study involved 35 mothers of toddlers selected through purposive sampling. The intervention consisted of nutrition counseling, group discussions, balanced menu demonstrations, and assistance from community health volunteers over a four-week period. Data were collected using a nutrition knowledge questionnaire that had been tested for validity and reliability. Data analysis was performed using the Paired Sample t-test with a 95% confidence level. The results showed that the mean nutritional knowledge score increased from 61.48 ± 10.27 before the intervention to 82.74 ± 8.65 after the intervention. Statistical analysis revealed a significant difference between pretest and posttest scores (p = 0.000; p < 0.05), indicating that community empowerment-based nutrition education had a significant effect on improving mothers' nutritional knowledge. It can be concluded that community empowerment-based nutrition education is effective in enhancing the nutritional knowledge of mothers with toddlers and may serve as a promotive strategy to improve child nutritional status.]]>
