April 28: Diet Diversity Gap Policies Flashcards
(11 cards)
How to improve diet diversity?
1) Improve availability of diverse & nutritious foods
Is there sufficient availability of a diverse diet in local markets?
a. Mono-cultures of grains in the developing world
b. Supermarket deserts issue in the US
2) Improve access to diverse & nutritious foods
Does the population have enough income to afford a diverse (and balanced) diet?
a. Income levels matter
b. Prices matter for nutrient dense foods: Are they affordable?
3) Improve demand for dietary diversity & higher nutrition
Does the population understand the importance of dietary diversity? Or the needs for certain nutrients?
a. Info campaigns to improve demand for dietary diversity
b. Increasing incomes (Bennett’s law) will help
4) Fortification to improve nutrient content of food: provides availability and usually
access, and either avoids needing improved demand, or induces food companies
to create improved demand.
How do you improve the diet for people who are semi-subsistence?
Semi-subsistence means that a majority of what they eat they produce on their own farms
Even what they don’t produce themselves is likely to have been produced nearby, by their neighbors or other local farms
Potential solutions
Improve the diversity of local production (improves availability, maybe access)
Improve availability of diverse products through the supply chain (not necessarily on farm or locally)
Improve food processing to make nutritious products available year-round
Ways to sort types of food consumption by nutri usefulness
- Nutrition-poor foods
Through loss of nutritive value (ie commonly cooked version has low nutrition)
Contaminated foods (e.g. aflatoxin in peanuts and maize) - Under-consumed foods or foods “missing” during part of the year
Seasonally available fruits and vegetables - Over-consumed foods
Foods that are consumed but are not particularly healthy (many grains, cassava)
Interventions should improve #1 and #2, while reducing the importance of #3
Malawi Diet Diversity: high, mid, and low in which vitamins/macronutri?
High: Zince, Protein, Energy
Mid: Fe
Low: Vit A
Solutions to Diet Diversity
- Food chain table/graph out
- Diet challenge // intervention methods
What do we learn from Malawi Diet Diversity problem?
- Large open opportunities to improve diet diversity
- biggest chance but hardest change = income effects
- Existing products can
a. bridge diet diversity ap
b. need to overcome seasonal deficits through storage, higher production, processing - There are large info deficits
- demand is still low for high nutri goods
- Maize will continue to be main food stable, low opportunities to fortify it - Returns to improving nutri could be v huge regarding:
- improved maternal and child nutri
- improved productivity of workforce
Nutri targeting from possible policy choices in Malawi
- Add groundnuts to the
fertilizer & improved seed
subsidy - A dried mango processing
plant - A project of small solar
mango driers - Information campaign
promoting leafy greens
What can the private sector do to improve nutri diversity?
Improve provision of nutritionally beneficial goods to rural markets
More food processing of nutritionally beneficial goods
More trade in nutritionally beneficial goods
What can the Malawi gov do
Revise the maize subsidy to include more nutritionally improved crops
Help the private sector value chains (subsidies, build roads, provide targeted credit)
Help the creation of more food processing
Invest in agricultural R&D that focuses on improving the nutritional quality of regular crops
What does the public need to do to improve diet diversity in Malawi?
Demand more nutrition in their food diet
Be willing to eat new foods
