Kano State government and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have procured 2,948 cartons of Ready to Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) worth N1 billion to feed about 17,000 severely malnourished children in the state.
Speaking during the distribution of the items at the primary healthcare centre in Takai local government area yesterday, the chief of UNICEF Kano field office, Mr. Rahama Farah, said about 11 million children or one in every three children under five years in Nigeria were experiencing severe food poverty.
Farah, who was represented by the field’s office health manger, Dr. Serekeberehan Deres, said about 50 percent of that number were more likely to experience wasting or a life-threatening malnutrition.
He also said in Kano, 51.9 percent or one out of two children experience similar threat with stunted growth and over 10 percent were likely to be too thin for their height.
He described child poverty as children’s inability to access and consume nutritious and diverse diet in early childhood – a sensitive period of high nutritional requirements for the physical growth and brain development of a child.
Farah noted that in an effort aimed at improving the nutrition situation across the country, UNICEF and development partners had made huge investments through the Child Nutrition Fund (CNF) to enable governments double their investments in essential nutrition commodities.
The UNICEF officer commended the state government for being the first state in Nigeria with the highest singular contribution of N500 million released to the CNF to match with an additional N500 million from his organisation.
In his remarks, Governor Abba Yusuf reiterated his government’s commitment to improve the health and well-being of the people, particularly children.
He said the state was reactivating a comprehensive management of acute malnutrition centers across all the 44 local government areas to address the critical health challenge.
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