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| Jatiyo Sangsad Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury speaking as the chief guest at the discussaion titled “The Global Nutrition Report 2015: Action and Accountability to Advanced Nutrition and Sustainable Development”, organised by International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) Bangladesh at a city hotel on Wednesday.— FE Photo |
More than 60 per cent of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition (SAM) in the country are more likely to come from severe food insecured households (HHs) compared to children having a normal nutrition status, experts said Wednesday.
They also said 30 to 40 per cent of the country's children live in slums deprived of proper water, sanitation and hygiene facilities. About 50 per cent of them are exposed to environmental 'enteropathy', a sub-clinical condition caused by constant fecal-oral contamination and resulting in blunting of intestinal 'villi' and intestinal inflammation, ultimately resulting in stunting.
"Next set of emerging issues is related to mother and adolescent girls. The proportion of women who are overweight or having obesity has reached a staggering level of 24 per cent in 2014 which was 9.0 per cent in 2004, 12 per cent in 2007 and 17 per cent in 2011," icddr,b senior scientist Dr Tahmeed Ahmed said while making a presentation at a discussion on nutrition.
He said about 4,00,000 to 5,00,000 children are still suffering from SAM which is a problem arising from food insecurity. Then low birth weight is another huge problem for addressing nutrition in Bangladesh as still 30 to 35 per cent children are born with low birth weight.
Mr Tahmeed was speaking as a panelist at a technical session of the launch of 'The Global Nutrition Report 2015: Action and Accountability to Advanced Nutrition and Sustainable Development' at a city hotel. International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) Bangladesh organised the event. National Parliament speaker Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury was present as the chief guest. Health ministry additional secretary Roxana Quader and state minister for finance MA Mannan were special guests.
IFPRI senior research fellow and co-chair of the Global Nutrition Report Lawrence Haddad presented the findings of the research. IFPRI Bangladesh representative Akhter Ahmed chaired the programme.
Mr Tahmeed noted that slums in Dhaka city are the foremost challenge as 30 to 40 per cent of the city people live there with poor sanitation, water and hygiene facilities.
He also identified food insecurity, adulteration and use of pesticides, hypertension, SAM, low birth weight of children and overweight and other non-communicable diseases as emerging problems of nutrition.
He said the World Federation of Nutrition recently suggested taking care of low birth weight and stunting.
About 20 per cent of the stunting problem can be directly attributed to low birth weight. If women's nutrition and low birth weight cannot be taken care of, Bangladesh cannot control stunting, he felt.
As part of the Lancet nutrition series, a package of 10 nutrition specific interventions can reduce 15 per cent mortality.
He suggested scaling up of basic nutrition interventions to reduce low birth weight and stunting, implement community-based management of acute malnutrition in high-burden regions, introduce interventions to prevent childhood overweight and obesity in high-prevalence countries.
Power and Participation Research Centre (PPRC) executive chairman Hossain Zillur Rahman said Bangladesh has done an excellent job in improving life expectancy. On the contrary, life expectancy of the rickshaw-pullers in the city has not improved.
So is the incidence of poverty reduction. Although Bangladesh has reduced its poverty rate, extreme poverty still remains a difficult issue. The rate of decline at the lower end is more difficult, he said.
"We have to have proper understanding of the disaggregated data," he added.
The former adviser to the caretaker government said construction of nutrition policy message is also an issue as nutrition was pushed as a stand-alone issue about a decade ago which has now become a cross-cutting one related to agriculture, health, education and urbanisation..
"I see one major gap with regard to success in nutrition agenda. Upward aspiration is dominating the policy agenda," he said, adding, "We need to see nutrition not only from poverty end but to connect it with the upward aspiration."
Executive director of Bangladesh Centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS) A Atiq Rahman said there are three issues in the world-there is not adequate food to feed the world population.
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