Global forum on food security and nutrition

Dhanya Praveen, Environment Protecion Training and Research Institute, Hyderabad, India

Thank for the opportunity. A few missing points are suggested.

 

Under Action Areas (Page.16)

There is adequate indication of the need to have integrated actions among the key players of nutrition. However the issue of close relationship of climate variability, change on food and nutritional security is completely ignored in the draft.  Unprecedented changes in the weather will affect the access to food, food intakes behaviour etc.. especially during heat waves and droughts. Tacking   Nutritional insecurities during of Climate Change and related disasters.

• 
  It’s a very well known fact that Climate change could affect amount of food produced, variety and nutritional value of food  and the Cost of food, However there is no mention of all these factors are not all mentioned in the the action plans .
  
• 
  Not only food , the availability Water -the key source for maintaining the metabolism of the body – gets affected by Climate changes and Disasters
  
• 
  Air pollution (GHG emission) has a direct bearing on the iron absorption rates in the body
  
• 
  Tacking Nutritional insecurities during Climate Change Disasters: The disruption of transportation and communication facilities may impact emergency responses with respect to food security and nutritional securities (other natural disasters- Earthquakes .will take longer recovery period).
  
• 
  Risks in the access to health services and finance -including the most marginalized and most vulnerable – during disaster period (Emergency, recovery / response period )is needed ( Page .6)
  

Under The aim

• 
  “to end all forms of malnutrition and leaving no one behind; Whether this is completely achievable ?
  
• 
  It may be better to have achievable aims as its very difficult to end the all forms of malnutrition.
  

Action area 1: Sustainable, resilient food systems for healthy diets
The report should analyze the concern of nutritional security with a Cross-sectoral livelihood perspective. Not only the small and marginalized strata. The modern lifestyles are actually adding to the malnutrition among rich strata of the society and children and old aged are the mostly hit category.


Action networks

• 
  There should be an National Action Plan on Nutritional security and state level action plan  for better implementation. There need to be nodal centre working to coordinate the activities for better implementation.[The establishment of an action network should be communicated to the joint FAO/WHO Secretariat in writing by the convening country. The joint Secretariat will also disseminate the action network information, news and tools]
  

Technical Support for implementation
The Nutrition Decade will strive to improve synergies in the provision of technical assistance by governments and international organizations in the context of development aid, as well as by NGOs, philanthropic foundations and the UN system.
In the backdrop of National vulnerability to nutritional insecurity, Governments is implementing various programmes and schemes for education, nutrition and health care for the women .To evaluate the efficiency of the Social Welfare Department’s various schemes of Ministry of Health and family welfare in improving the health and social status in children and women through qualitative and quantitative assessments based on Key Performance Indicators (KPI) could also be done. An online portal dash board showing the performance and achieved targets and key milestones with respect to each nutritional components can be taken up.

Governance

The Nutrition Decade will not seek to establish new structures but will facilitate broad consultation among stakeholders to seek alignment of priorities, policy instruments, and monitoring mechanisms.

To have a Micro level planning framework for monitoring and evaluation for the priority scheme/ area/district and ensure success in each plan is necessary.

Surendra Kumar Mishra, Ansul-India Health & Management Services, India

Dear Colleagues,

Thank you very much for sending me the report of FSN Global Forum on Maximizing the Impact of the UN Decade of Action on Nutrition, and inviting feedback on the Report.

I have just a couple of suggestions to make:

1. 
   There is no clear mention of achieving the set targets of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030 in this brief, although the 2nd goal of SDGs is “Nutrition” and all countries are working towards that goal. Will this UN Decade (2016-30) help in any way in achieving those country-specific targets on Nutrition? If so, kindly elucidate it further.
   
2. 
   Coming to LMIC settings including countries of South Asia, there is a genuine problem of food processing/cooking that leads to cultural diversification of food habits, leading towards the loss of nutritive values of consumed food items. This must get prioritized in all interventions and should get focused in nutrition polices, programs and practices.
   

Looking forward to your earliest response to this regard,

With my best wishes,

>SKMishra

Dr. Surendra Kumar Mishra, Director (Global Programs)
Ansul-India Health & Management Services (AIHMS)

T- 456 E, First Floor, Chirag Delhi, New Delhi –110017 (INDIA) 

Bruno Kistner, Asian Roundtable on Food Innovation for Improved Nutrition, Singapore

Following points should be mentioned:

If food variety is too expensive for low income populations, governments can consider to mandate food fortification. An important aspect which is widely neglected is effectiveness. Human does not function on one or 2 nutrients alone. The inclusion of the B-Vitamins for proper messaging in the body and proper cell functioning is essential. Contrary to wide believes fortification with B-Vitamins is not costly. To provide all essential B-Vitamins to 100 million people cost less than 20 million US$ per year.

If industry is providing healthy food options at low prices positive taxation of governments should be considered in order to increase the accessability and availablility of healthy food options.

Governments can support the approval and distribution of healthy food options, specially food options that are targetting the first 1000 days, i.e. adolescant girls.

Small and medium sized enterprises provide 85 % of the global packaged food supply. The SME's must be included in policies that promote sugar, fat and salt reduction and fortification.