Nutrition post-2015 goal

This article was originally featured at the Zambia Daily Mail.

AS DISCUSSIONS on the post-2015 development process gather momentum, it is important to remember that nutrition must be understood as both an input to, and an outcome of, the sustainable development goals (SDGs).

Malnutrition does not just result from inadequate food, but also from a host of interlinking processes that include healthcare, education, sanitation and hygiene, access to resources, women’s empowerment, among others.

The burden of malnutrition continues to weigh heavily on development efforts in Zambia. Much like trying to juggle a double-edged sword.
Zambia is experiencing the dual problem of malnutrition, i.e. the rate of under-nutrition as represented by alarmingly high stunting levels affecting 40 percent of children under five years old while over-nutrition, measured as overweight/obesity is rapidly on the rise, currently affecting 23 percent of women alone.

What is appalling is that this has been the case for some time now, yet despite the high levels, malnutrition has remained largely a silent crisis with limited attention on the country’s immediate priorities on the development agenda.

However, all hope is not lost. Recent efforts, pioneered by the Global Scaling-Up Nutrition movement (SUN), show promise in redressing this situation. Consensus on and a drive to invest in nutrition at the global level have spurred greater action in Zambia. With Zambia joining the SUN movement in 2010, there has been a noteworthy change with regards to the place for nutrition in development.

Zambia has seen increasingly concerted, multi-level, multi-stakeholder effort to reverse the trends in malnutrition.

It is, therefore, without doubt that Zambia’s joining of the SUN movement has contributed to the cementing of a strong foundation for advancing nutrition in the country. It is for this reason that the Zambia Civil Society Scaling-Up Nutrition Alliance (CSO-SUN), supports a sustainable development goal (SDG) on food and nutrition security which would continue to excavate much needed local and global attention to addressing nutrition challenges in the years to come.

UNFINISHED AGENDA OF MGGS

In 2000, world leaders adopted the Millennium Declaration and agreed on a set of time-bound development goals – the millennium development goals (MDGs).

According to the blueprint established, the deadline for the MDGs is September 2015. While progress has been made in poverty eradication and human development globally, the goals are far from being achieved. MDG1 brought attention to the need to improve food and nutrition security (Goal 1C: to halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger).

With its two indicators for monitoring progress: indicator 1.8 prevalence of underweight children under five years of age; and indicator 1.9 proportion of population below minimum level of dietary energy consumption, also called undernourishment.

It is likely that a limited focus on nutrition within the MDGs, and lack of specification on how targets were to be contributed to less than optimal country ownership and leadership, as well as failure to exploit synergies between nutrition and other sectors.

Indeed, many national nutrition strategies in the 2000s focused on treatment of acute malnutrition, and on production of staple grains. Today a huge burden of knowledge exists on effective actions and the need for addressing nutrition adequately through well-coordinated, multi-sectoral approach of actions.

The fragmentation of nutrition efforts in the 2000s, not only limited progress toward the achievement of MDG1 targets, but probably also slowed progress in achieving other related targets such as poverty reduction, education, child mortality and maternal health.

SETTING POST-2015 NUTRITION GOALS

In spite of the influence the SUN movement has had on Zambia to advance nutrition through its emphasis on multi-sectoral and multi-stakeholder approaches towards addressing nutrition development challenges, a goal on ending hunger, achieving food security and improved nutrition and promoting sustainable agriculture in the post-2015 development agenda would ensure that progress is sustained and accelerated.
This goal is of great importance as it attracts stakeholders to the need to address nutrition globally and create the much needed focus at country level.

Additionally, it brings nutrition into the public policy limelight and helps maintain it there as government will be required to demonstrate progress on performance on national development targets set by reporting in global gatherings such as the United Nations General Assembly.
As a civil society advocate, I am of the considered opinion that the world would draw stakeholders’ attention to the fight against malnutrition in all its forms by agreeing on the proposed post- 2015 SDG goal number two that encompasses ending hunger, achieving food security, improving nutrition and promoting sustainable agriculture.

This would raise the political profile of nutrition and eventually transform policy- implementation in-country.
It would then facilitate a revolution in which policy making will focus on the role of nutrition across different sectors including agriculture, education, social protection, health, water and sanitation, among others. Ultimately, this will lead to increased commitment to addressing nutrition as a top priority on the national development agenda.

Finally, it will also make a legitimate case for civil society to push for the nutrition agenda to be a priority on the government development agenda.

Unlike during the time of the MDGs, civil society is now more organised in Zambia to ensure that the nutrition post-2015 goal and aspirations are orderly incorporated into the national development policies.