Addressing Nutritional Concerns

What is the issue?

The urgency to address poor nutrition in India especially among children, adolescent girls and women is compelling.

What is the status of under nutrition in India?

• According to the Global Nutrition Report 2016 and the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2017, India ranks at 100 out of 119 countries with a low overall score of 31.4.
• Among children less than 5 years, wasting (low weight for height), continues to be 21% in the 2017 index, it was 20% in 1992.
• There has been a reduction in stunting (height for age) from 61.9% in 1992 to 38.4% in 2017.
• Mortality among children less than 5 years old has declined to around 5% from 11% during the same period.
• However, 25% of India’s children less than 5 years old are still malnourished.
• Added to this is the fact that 190.7 million people in India sleep hungry every night.
• Over half of adolescent girls and women are anaemic.

What measures were taken in this regard?

• Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) has a network of 1.4 million Anganwadi Centres.
• It thus reaches almost 100 million beneficiaries who include pregnant and nursing mothers and children up to 6 years.
• Mid-day meals (MDM) reach almost 120 million children in schools.
• Public Distribution System (PDS) reaches over 800 million people under the National Food Security Act.
• National Nutrition Strategy (NNS) - Union government has announced this flagship program of the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
• This will be anchored through the National Nutrition Mission (NNM) and has set very ambitious targets for 2022.
• The PoshanAbhiyaan has also specified three-year targets to reduce stunting, under-nutrition and low birth weight by 2% each year, and to reduce anaemia by 3% each year.
• Additionally, NITI Aayog has worked on a National Nutrition Strategy (NNS).
• It isolated the 100 most backward districts for stunting and prioritised those for interventions.

What are the concerns with government schemes?

• Both the NNS and the NNM have recognised the criticality of working collaboratively across Ministries.
• Yet both are silent on the constructive role of private sector, development agencies and civil society.
• There are no initiatives to exploring new models to address the structural and systemic issues on a priority basis.
• In the absence of coordination with industry to create an effective supply chain, this proposed intervention will be another missed opportunity.

What are the measures to be taken?

• An overhaul of capacity and capability of 3 existing programmes such as ICDS, MDM and NNM should be the first priority.

• For purposeful action both union and state government need to have common goals and metrics for improving nutrition.
• They should come up with metrics that are clear and measurable and a real-time tracking mechanism.
• The approach, commitment and resources therefore have to be inter-generational, multi-sector, and multi-dimensional.
• Government needs to mandate and scale staple food fortification comprising edible oil, wheat, rice and dairy products, in addition to salt.
• Nutrition has to be “marketed” and made interesting, engaging, simple and personally relevant.
• This is an expertise where the private sector can meaningfully contribute.
• Well-structured public-private partnerships could thus be the catalyst.

Source: The Hindu