Awareness needed to ensure nutrition level

Nutritionists have said that there has been significant progress in terms of food security and hunger reduction in the country. However, the nutrition level has not been achieved in comparison to that. 

They highlighted the necessity of bringing variation in food, keeping it unadulterated and raising awareness about nutrition to ensure the nutrition level, especially for the poor community.

The experts said this during a roundtable titled ‘Role of Nutrition Smart CommUNITY in improving nutrition security for rural poor community’, held at Prothom Alo office in the city’s Karwan bazar area on Thursday.

Germany-based development organisation Welthungerhilfe organised the roundtable together with Prothom Alo.

During the discussion, professor Shah Golam Nabi, director of the government’s Institute of Public Health Nutrition said, “Usually the issue of food security gets priority in our food-related discussions. Only the issues like ‘if it filled the belly and provided satisfaction or not’ are discussed.”

“It is not considered how nutritious the food is. Rice is the staple food in our country and it fulfils our requirement of carbohydrates. Though it satisfies the hunger it doesn’t fill the required level of nutrition,” he added.

Awareness of food is a must to ensure the nutrition level. As many as 17 different ministries of the government work separately about nutrition. For achieving exceptional success in food security coordinated initiative is required from all. However, no matter which programme is taken up it has to be sustainable, he insisted.

Nazma Shaheen, professor of nutrition and food sciences at Dhaka University said, “The government’s main target in the millennium development goals (MDG) programme was to eradicate hunger. In that aspect, it was possible to drop the number of hungry people below 2 per cent within 2017-18.”

“This is a significant achievement. However, we are lagging behind when it comes to nutrition. We are lacking in terms of variation in food. In order to achieve the goal of ensuring health for all, the nutrition level of food has to be guaranteed,” she added.

Director of the family nutrition garden project under the department of agricultural extension Akram Hossain Chowdhury said that the lack of nutrition cannot usually be seen through the naked eye. In many cases, children are growing up with nutrition deficiency.

If the mothers suffer from this problem during pregnancy, that would affect their children also. The people need to be made aware of nutrition. The government has many initiatives working towards this end. The nutrition garden project is one of them. This project is working down to the union level, he added.

Prothom Alo associate editor Abdul Quayum initiated the discussion while project head at Welthungerhilfe, Mamunur Rashid, presented the concept paper.

Welthungerhilfe is working on a project titled ‘Nutrition Smart CommUNITY’ to ensure nutrition security for the people in Bangladesh, India and Nepal. They have completed the first and second phase of project work in Bangladesh respectively between 2018-2020 and 2020-2023.

In context of their experience the concept paper stated that according to the global nutrition report about 36.7 per cent of the 15 to 49 years-old women in the country are victims of malnutrition. Nutrition deficiency in the mother also has an impact on their children. In consequence, they have to suffer various problems later in life.

The concept paper also stated that while Bangladesh has been noticed to make some progress in achieving global nutrition targets, it’s sluggish. They have recommended four strategies to follow and five habits to practise for the upliftment of the nutrition level.

Component director of the SACP project under the department agricultural marketing and deputy secretary Md Raju Ahmed said that having knowledge of nutrition is extremely important to fulfil the nutritional deficiency. School level teachers can have a role in this. Plus, food fairs could be organised for people’s participation and to create an interest among them.

Right to Food Bangladesh general secretary Mohsin Ali said that the presence of a right to food act is necessary to ensure the right to food for people from every level of the society. For nutrition, every single person has to get fish, meat and milk alongside other food items. To guarantee the right to food announced by the United Nations (UN), there has to be arrangements of nutritional food for the ultra-poor.

While speaking, non-government organisation ‘Anando’ chairman professor Anisuzzaman emphasised ensuring nutrition level for the residents of the hill tracts among other marginal communities. Because, the food they usually consume has a huge nutrition deficiency.

Programme specialist at SAARC Agriculture Centre, Nasreen Sultana said that women indeed are falling victim of malnutrition more. If women didn’t have the appropriate level of nutrition during adolescence, it creates a negative impact on herself and her child during pregnancy.

Professor of women and gender studies at Dhaka University, Tania Haque stressed on keeping food free from adulteration and contamination alongside ensuring nutrition level in her speech.

Dean of the arts and social sciences faculty at City University and member of FIVAD executive committee, professor Abu Zayed Mohammad said that the issue of nutrition doesn’t get as much importance as other programmes of the government. Still the programmes that are taken lack proper monitoring.

Thanking the speakers for their comments, country director of Welthungerhilfe in Bangladesh, Pankaj Kumar, said that Bangladesh has moved ahead of India, Pakistan and Nepal in hunger eradication. However, even though the hunger rate is decreasing, the nutritional deficiency is not. It’s difficult to end this problem. The government of Germany will continue providing assistance in that case, he added.

The roundtable was moderated by Prothom Alo assistant editor Firoz Choudhury.