Key stakeholders, including federal and state lawmakers drawn from the House of Representatives, the state Houses of Assembly and a coalition of civil society organisations (CSOs), have expressed dismay at the prevailing hunger and malnutrition in the country and called for a holistic action to address the scourge.
At a two-day stakeholders’ meeting that ended over the weekend in Uyo, the Akwa Ibom State capital, the conferees underscored the importance of nutrition for healthy living, impacting education and productivity for national development.
They, therefore, advocated for the creation of nutrition departments or units across the federal, state ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), and across the 774 local government areas.
The communique read by the drafting committee chairman and deputy speaker of the Kano State House of Assembly, Muhammad Bello Butubutu, stressed the need for commitments from state assembly members to strengthen engagements towards increased funding for nutrition.
The communique urged the states to leverage on the 1:1 Child Nutrition Fund (CNF) to procure relevant nutritious foods, especially for breastfeeding, pregnant and nursing mothers to safeguard them from maternal and childhood health threats.
The conferees stressed the need for nutrition commodities in all focal states including Kano, Kaduna, Niger, Lagos, Nasarawa and Bauchi, in the pilot phase of the scheme.
“Investments in nutrition yield high returns, with every $1 spent to improve infant and maternal health,” the communique noted, and called for the strengthening of policy frameworks and legislative actions to address the problem.
“Health, agriculture, education, social protection and other variables must align efforts to fortified food standards,” the resolution stressed and solicited for a six-month paid maternity leave to be urgently adopted by all states to address malnutrition burden in the focal states.
The action conference organised in conjunction with CS – SUNN, finns, UNICEF, and FHI360, tasked spouses of LGA chairmen to be in the vanguard and tool for innovative strategy on financing, funding and resource allocations to tackle the challenge of nutritious foods.
The communique stressed the need for investment in supplementary and therapeutic foods for proper nutrition policies in states and tasked legislators to be committed to reviewing and strengthening existing public awareness campaigns including advocacies for increased budgetary allocation to nutrition programmes.
“There should be increased budgetary allocation to the relevant sectors, and legislators must actively advocate for nutrition as a priority in legislative processes.
“Legislative advocacy and oversight assignments on the importance of nutrition at various discussions and decision-making processes to ensure timely and efficient disbursement of allocated funds.
“Promotion and partnerships between government, civil society, the private sector must imbibe the Nutrition 774, N774 Initiative, and should be adopted to state – specific context and regular oversight to ensure effective implementation of nutrition programmes and policies,” the communique stressed.
