New Delhi, May 11 (Inditop.com) The women and child development and the health ministries have joined hands and called upon other ministries to synergise for tackling the issue of malnutrition which causes more than 50 percent of deaths among children.
Releasing a joint report by the two ministries Tuesday, Minister of Women and Child Development Krishna Tirath said: “There has to be a synergy between all ministries like health, rural development, education and women and child development to ensure that we are able to meet targets and tackle the issue of malnutrition.”
“A lack of synergy between the existing programmes is a challenge in tackling the issue in a comprehensive manner,” she added.
There are a number of government programmes in the country to tackle malnutrition.
“The government programmes which have the potential to impact nutrition like a well-funded agriculture development programme should have nutrition as a focus. Lack of cadre of public health nutritionists is another gap,” the report said.
At birth itself, one-third of children have low birth weight. In the age group of 0-6 years, malnutrition worsens and reaches its peak with the highest level for any age group.
“There should be strengthening of a nutrition surveillance by proper mapping of high risk and vulnerable districts. Nutrition should be made central to the development agenda,” the report added.
A counselling campaign should also be launched for behaviour change and feeding habits, it suggested.
