By Alex Abutu
Last week, a coalition of agencies under the United Nations released a report calling for urgent action to address acute malnutrition that is threatening millions of vulnerable children in Africa with Nigeria listed among the likes of Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Niger, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Yemen.
This categorization is shameful for us as a nation considering the billions of naira the federal government claims they are spending on school feeding and other nutrition enhancement programmes in the country.
The United Nations agencies are calling for urgent action to protect the most vulnerable children in the 15 countries hardest hit by an unprecedented food and nutrition crisis.
According to them, conflict, climate shocks, the ongoing impacts of COVID-19 and rising costs of living are leaving increasing numbers of children acutely malnourished while key health, nutrition and other life-saving services are becoming less accessible. Currently, more than 30 million children in the 15 worst-affected countries suffer from wasting – or acute malnutrition – and 8 million of these children are severely wasted, the deadliest form of undernutrition. This is a major threat to children’s lives and their long-term health and development, the impacts of which are felt by individuals, their communities and their countries.
In response, five UN agencies – the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Food Programme (WFP) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) – are calling for accelerated progress on the Global Action Plan on Child Wasting. It aims to prevent, detect and treat acute malnutrition among children in the worst-affected countries.
The Federal Government through Chris Ngige, the Minister of Labour and Employment, in a meeting with Mary Leornard, US ambassador to Nigeria, in October 2022 said the Federal Government had spent $100 million on feeding 10 million pupils under the national school feeding programme.
Hajiya Aishatu Digil, Team Lead, National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP) was also quoted as saying that the Federal Government spent N999 million daily to feed approximately 10 million pupils across the country.
A total of N1.6 billion has been budgeted for the homegrown school feeding programme, in the 2023 appropriation budget which was presented by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) to the National Assembly late last year.
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The question begging for an answer is: In view of the above, how come Nigeria is still listed along with war-torn countries for its inability to cater for the nutritional need of children, her most vulnerable population?
Does the government not know what causes poor nutrition? Or are we just feeding the children without recourse to what the food is? Or is the said money and allocation only on paper and not disbursed as expected?
Experts have identified poor eating habits which include under- or over-eating, not having enough of the healthy foods needed on daily basis, or consuming too many types of food and drink, which are low in fibre or high in fat, salt and/or sugar as some of the reasons for mass malnutrition which is currently being witnessed in the country.
A recent study identified four major challenges militating against nutritional improvement in society and this includes a lack of coordination between stakeholders, lack of resources, lack of training opportunities, and low sustainability of the program.
But can this be accurate in Nigeria given the political will and fund allocation by the Federal Government in the last fiscal year? Is there something we are not doing correctly? Is there any group or government agency monitoring the situation? How long do we have to be reminded by the United Nations of our local responsibilities?
The Global Action Plan addresses the need for a multi-sectoral approach and highlights priority actions across maternal and child nutrition through the food, health, water and sanitation, and social protection systems. In response to increasing needs, the UN agencies identified five priority actions that will be effective in addressing acute malnutrition in countries affected by conflict and natural disasters and in humanitarian emergencies. Scaling up these actions as a coordinated package will be critical for preventing and treating acute malnutrition in children, and averting a tragic loss of life.
The UN agencies call for decisive and timely action to prevent this crisis from becoming a tragedy for the world’s most vulnerable children. All agencies urge greater investment in support of a coordinated UN response that will meet the unprecedented needs of this growing crisis before it is too late.
“This situation is likely to deteriorate even further in 2023,” said QU Dongyu, Director-General of the FAO of the United Nations. “We must ensure availability, affordability and accessibility of healthy diets for young children, girls, and pregnant and lactating women. We need urgent action now to save lives, and to tackle the root causes of acute malnutrition, working together across all sectors.” Qu said.
“Today’s cascading crises are leaving millions of children wasted and have made it harder for them to access key services. Wasting is painful for the child, and in severe cases, can lead to death or permanent damage to children’s growth and development. We can and must turn this nutrition crisis around through proven solutions to prevent, detect, and treat child wasting early” Catherine Russell, Executive Director, United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)
“More than 30 million children are acutely malnourished across the 15 worst-affected countries, so we must act now, and we must act together. It is critical that we collaborate to strengthen social safety nets and food assistance to ensure Specialized Nutritious Foods are available to women and children who need them the most.” David Beasley, Executive Director, World Food Programme (WFP).
If we lack manpower, competence or proper management in tackling this menace, the time to cry out is now otherwise how do we explain to our children that after spending all the dollars, they are still nowhere near their counterparts in other countries in terms of nutritional wellbeing?
