BHUBANESWAR:Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday promised more investment and Government support to the initiatives for tackling nutritional issues in the population in State.
However, only monetary support and announcement of programmes will not be fruitful unless there is wholehearted involvement of the community to make the interventions successful. “I urge all citizens and State machinery to work for better outcome,” he said at a round table on Global Nutrition Report (GNR) 2014 here.
Improving nutritional status among the population is not restricted to provisioning of good food to the people. It involves multi-sectoral engagement from education, health, sanitation to environmental hygiene. The Government has launched several programmes like ICDS, mid-day meal, Mamata to address different issues concerning malnutrition. While striving to enhance the food basket, Government has introduced Rs one kg rice, food security scheme and provisioning of farm and agricultural units to promote production of protein-rich food like pulses and cereals, he added.
According to available data, more than 40 per cent of children below the age of three years are underweight, 45 per cent of all children are stunted and 19.5 per cent are wasted. It is also seen that nearly 65 per cent of children from six to 59 months are anaemic.
Though there has been improvement in the malnutrition status in the population over recent years, the interventions should be accelerated and made more effective through convergent action across sectors, departments and agencies, opined experts.
“Reduction of under-nutrition requires concerted action across the board. Many States have made significant interventions in this regard and the positive results are becoming visible now,” State Health Secretary and member of the Independent Expert Group for the GNR Arti Ahuja said.
The Global Nutrition Report aims to contribute to country-led efforts to strengthen accountability, share learning experiences, highlight bottlenecks and show the path to overcoming the challenges. The benefits of improved nutrition cascade through the lifecycle and across generations, for which the costs of failing to act are tragically high for all countries, co-author Lawrence Haddad from International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) stated.
Minister for Women and Child Development Usha Devi and Secretary Saswat Mishra also spoke.