Call for community-based nutrition service

They called on planners, politicians, donors and other stakeholders to put more focus on and give more financial attention to the issue.

They also called for providing nutritious food and micronutrient supplements to women of reproductive age to combat malnutrition.

Tap here to add The Daily Star as a trusted source

The Unicef and the National Nutrition Programme co-organised the workshop on 'Ensuring Nutrition for mother, adolescents and children: A future direction' at the Brac centre in Rajendrapur.

NGO representatives, government officials, media personnel and development partners are taking part in the two-day workshop.

Since mid-eighties, Bangladesh has reduced the proportion of underweight children by 20 percent and stunting in children under five has dropped by 25 percent, the participants said and attributed the success to massive mobilisation of community nutrition promoters and behaviour change communication programme.

During this period, infant mortality rate has decreased from 94 to 77 per 1,000 live births (the rate in 1974 was 140).

The entire country would be brought under national nutrition promotion programme by 2010, said the government officials. Also, safe motherhood and nutrition-related issues will be included in the school curriculum.

However, the prevalence of malnutrition in Bangladesh is one of the highest in the world, with about 600 to 700 children dying of malnutrition-related causes a day.

Nearly 50 percent of under five children are underweight and more than half are stunted. Almost half of women suffer from chronic energy deficit while more than 60 percent of pregnant women are anaemic.

The National Nutrition Programme (NNP), an extension of the Bangladesh Integrated Nutrition Project (BINP), has been working in 105 upazilas to combat malnutrition, the speakers said.

More than five million children will participate in the growth monitoring and nutritional promotion programmes under the NNP and over one million pregnant and lactating women will benefit from weight monitoring and counselling, they said.