Most infants in 91 countries are malnourished: UNICEF Report

NEW DELHI: United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) released a report titled ‘Fed to Fail? The Crisis of Children’s Diets in Early Life’ on Wednesday, September 22.  The report said that a combination of crises due to COVID-19, conflict and the climate breakdown had stunted progress on children’s nutrition in 91 countries.

The report said that 50% of the children aged from six to twenty-three months across developing countries were not fed the minimum number of daily meals, and even fewer proportions of those children had a diverse diet that could meet their minimum body requirements.

Poor diet and partial hunger can force children behind in school, make them vulnerable to illness and suffer the effects of malnutrition. The report estimates that 11 million children globally who are under two years of age are vulnerable to wasting. Jenny Vaughan, Senior Policy Advisor on Child Health, UNICEF United Kingdom, said that millions of children across the globe are affected by the life-limiting outcomes of poor nutrition. He mentioned that Government of UK is planning to invest 600 million pounds in nutrition-relevant programmes to reach 50 million children over the next five years. From this, UK hopes to contribute in addressing the problem and put millions of children on a path to healthier and brighter future.

According to the study, nutrition was worst for children in rural or poorer families. It stated that the diets of 62% of the children aged between six and 23 months in Latin America and the Caribbean met the minimum diversity requirements, whereas less than a quarter of the children in Africa and only 19% in South Asia had their minimum diversity requirements met. Additionally, many families are buying their food rather than producing it themselves, even in rural areas, which has made people more dependent on food systems that do not address the dietary needs of people. The report established that only a third of children less than two years of age in many developing countries are fed what they need for healthy growth. Moreover, no visible progress has been made on improving their nutrition over the past decade.

Qu Dongyu, Director-General, UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, commented that many of the current agri-food practices are exacting a heavy toll on the planet. “Our agri-food systems are not functioning properly,” he added. According to Dongyu, the key is to transform the system that delivers food from tillage to table and would rest on actions taken at the local and international level.