Nations join forces to tackle malnutrition

More than 170 countries have come together to work towards adopting recommendations on policies and investments to help eradicate malnutrition by ensuring that all people have access to healthier and more sustainable diets.

The Rome Declaration on Nutrition and a framework for action will suggest recommendations for policies and programmes to address nutrition across multiple sectors.

The move came at the opening of the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2), organised by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO).

The framework recognises the importance that governments play in addressing nutrition issues and challenges with stakeholders including civil society, the private sector and affected communities.

To begin with, the framework has set out 60 recommendations that governments may incorporate into their national nutrition, health, agriculture, education, development and investment plans to provide better nutrition for all.

Governments have been called upon to promote nutrition-enhancing agriculture by integrating nutrition objectives into the design and implementation of agricultural programmes to ensure food security and enable healthy diets.

FAO director-general José Graziano da Silva said: "We have the knowledge, expertise and resources needed to overcome all forms of malnutrition. Governments must lead the way. But the push to improve global nutrition must be a joint effort, involving civil society organisations and the private sector."

The framework will involve monitoring frameworks to track progress, as well as nutrition targets and milestones based on internationally agreed indicators. The countries who have signed for the framework will need to achieve specific results by 2025, which would include existing targets for improving maternal, infant and young child nutrition and for reducing nutrition-related risk factors for noncommunicable diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and certain cancers.

WHO director-general Dr Margaret Chan said: "The world’s food system-with its reliance on industrialised production and globalised markets, produces ample supplies, but creates some problems for public health.

"Part of the world has too little to eat, leaving millions vulnerable to death or disease caused by nutrient deficiencies. Another part overeats, with widespread obesity pushing life-expectancy figures backwards and pushing the costs of health care to astronomical heights."

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Image: The Rome Declaration on Nutrition and a Framework for Action were adopted today at the start of ICN2. Photo: courtesy of FAO.