By Meletus EZE
The African Development Bank (ADB) in collaboration with Big Win Philanthropy and Dangote Foundation launched ambitious plan to improve child nutrition and fight stunting.
A statement issued by management of the bank in Abuja on Wednesday, said the objective was to reduce stunting among African children under five by 40 per cent in the year 2025.
The statement said partnership with Big Win Philanthropy and Dangote Foundation had unveiled a new Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Action Plan aimed at raising investments toward reducing stunting by 40 per cent in Africa.
“Africa loses 25 billion dollars per year in costs attributed to child morbidity and mortality, impaired cognitive, physical, and economic development caused by malnutrition. Yet these losses are almost entirely preventable.
“The ambitious Action Plan is looking for additional support and commitments from governments for nutrition,’’ it added.
It quoted Jennifer Blanke, the Vice-President, Agriculture, Human and Social Development of the Bank as stressing the “importance of engaging with the private sector, if long-lasting results would be achieved’’.
Blanke said that these losses would have been averted through preventable measures.
She explained that through the Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Action Plan, the Bank committed to scale up the proportion of investments that were ‘nutrition-smart’ in agriculture, water, sanitation and hygiene, social and health sectors.
“In terms of human development, nutrition is as important as investments in infrastructure and power in stimulating economic growth,’’ she said.
The statement as quoted the Chief Executive Officer of Dangote Foundation, Zouera Youssoufou as saying “to put money at the ADB to develop this nutrition strategy makes sense’’.
“We are really happy to see the strategy come together following a two-year journey.
“In 2017, more than a third of the world’s stunted children under the age of five lived in Africa with stunting rates ranging from 35.6 per cent in East Africa to 32.1 per cent, 29.9 per cent, 29.1 per cent, and 17.3 per cent in Central Africa, West Africa, Southern Africa and Northern Africa respectively.
“The Plan also revealed that Africa is the only region in the world where the number of stunted children has risen in the past few years,’’ Youssoufou said.
She said that the plan would focus on integrating nutrition smart interventions into projects in the Bank’s extensive agriculture pipeline.
She added that the Bank’s Feed Africa Strategy executed the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP)’s goals of contributing to elimination of extreme hunger, malnutrition, and poverty.
The statement quoted Jamie Cooper, President, Big Win Philanthropy of being thrilled with President Akinwumi Adesina’s leadership in giving greater priority to nutrition and wider human capital investment agenda.
Cooper said that leveraging investments across five sectors and encouraging its member countries to do the same pointing out that ADB “is achieving ‘double wins’ for every dollar spent, improving lives and generating economic growth.”
