Hoima district to host WFD celebrations next Wednesday

By Our Reporter

Uganda will hold national celebrations for the 40^th World Food Day (WFD) next Wednesday in the western district of Hoima, according to the minister of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries (MAAIF), Vincent Bamulangaki Ssempijja.

The venue for the celebrations will be Bulindi Zonal Agriculture Research and Development Institute (Bulindi ZARDI)– situated in Hoima district in Bunyoro sub region. 

Bulindi is one of the 9 Zonal Agricultural Research and Development Institute (ZARDI) focusing on the Western agro ecological zone of Bunyoro Sub regions.

This year’s theme is: “Our Actions are our Future. Healthy Diets for a zero Hunger World”.

The focus is on hunger, under nutrition, malnutrition and how they impact on development.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) defines hunger as food deprivation, or undernourishment, the consumption of too few calories to provide the minimum amount of dietary energy required for a healthy and productive life.

Hunger is distress associated with inadequate food energy intake while Malnutrition refers to either under-nutrition (problems of deficiencies) or over-nutrition (problems of overweight and obesity)

Global Hunger

The world today has 7.2 billion people and 820 million go to bed hungry and are malnourished.

Worldwide levels of hunger dropped to 21.8% (2017) from 27% in 2015 and this reflects overall reductions in prevalence of under nutrition, child stunting and child wasting and child mortality.

The 2017 Global Hunger Index shows positive developments on many fronts, but there are still deep inequalities in hunger and under nutrition at the regional, national, and subnational levels.

For developed countries (Europe, USA, Latin America, Russia, Japan China,) the Global Hunger Index was in the range of 7.8, South East Asia 12.8%, and Africa South of the Sahara 29.4%. In Uganda the Global Hunger Index Is 33% implying one in every three Ugandans face acute food insecurity.

The overall nutrition status in Uganda as per Global Hunger Index (GHI) indicators shows:

·         33% of children below 5 years are stunted

·         22% underweight

·         6% wasted

·         22% of women suffer from maternal malnutrition

·         30% of men undernourished mainly due to low food intake and alcohol consumption

·         8% of population in urban areas overweight and obese due to over-nutrition

Impact of hunger/cost of malnutrition

Malnutrition affects agricultural productivity, women who provide 60-70 % of labour in farming activities is undernourished and underweight due to the heavy workloads gardening, fetching water, and collecting firewood and home chores. Men who consume alcohol also contribute to a weak workforce.

Studies have shown high anemia rates in leads to USD 335million of productivity or (0.6% GDP loss) the loss goes over 1% GDP if loss in productivity for men is computed.

Annually close to 170,000 children are born underweight and this leads to USD 5 million spent on incubation facilities while 16,000 who die of low birth weight cause a loss of USD 38million.

Iodine deficiency leads to cretinismor poor mental development and this affects educability of our young children and future work force.

“Improving nutrition status is therefore a critical issue in the development process. It requires: Increasing agricultural production and productivity, food distribution, food access, utilization of food resources, healthy environment and nutrition education programs to improve knowledge and skills in meal preparation,” says minister Ssempijja.

Zero hunger

At global Zero Hunger is Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 2) which is the International Policy Framework for 194 countries to reduce hunger to Zero by 2030.

The 2017 Global Hunger Index shows hunger dropped from 27% in 2015 to 21.8% in 2017. This declining trend shows a promising trend that Zero Hunger by 2030 is possible if concerted efforts are put in place.

In Uganda the challenge is population continues to grow at a rapid rate of 3.2% per annum; while agricultural productivity is at 2.9% per annum. There is a 0.3% food gap that must be addressed for all the country is to move towards Zero Hunger by 2030.

Why Zero Hunger is desired

Zero hunger can help build a safer, more prosperous world for everyone.  Studies have shown a dollar invested in hunger prevention could return between $15 and $139 in benefits and Zero hunger could save the lives of 3.1 million children a year¹

Furthermore studies have also shown ending child under nutrition could increase a developing country’s GDP by 16.5 percentand ending nutrition-related child mortality could increase a workforce by 9.4 percent.⁶

What MAAIF is doing

The Food and Nutrition Policy 2003, the National Agricultural Policy 2013, National Action Plan for Nutrition 2015 and the National Agricultural Extension Policy 2015 address natural resource management issues, food security and call for “Nutrition for All” interventions to improve the nutrition status in this country.

MAAIF mandate specifically is responsible for:

·         Food security, household income and exports

·         Increased production and productivity

·         Promoting agro-processing, value chain development and commercialization of the agricultural sector 

·         Bio-fortification of crops to address nutrient (protein, iron, zinc, vitamin A) deficiencies

Some of the efforts to address end hunger by 2030 include:

MAAIF/ASSP 2015/16-2019/20 Food Based intervention and dietary diversification to ensure food security promoting 15 priority  commodity interventions for; maize, bean, rice, cassava , banana, fruits (citrus, pineapples, mangoes), vegetables, coffee, tea, potato and dairy, beef, fisheries, poultry and apiary commodities products

Multi-sector Food Security and Nutrition and Pastoralist Livelihood Resilience Projects promoting Agricultural Nutrition friendly interventions which include:

·         enterprise mix of vegetable gardens, rearing small livestock, fish ponds and agro-forestry projects in schools and communities

·         Nutrition Education to provide adequate nutrition knowledge and skills in food preparation

·         Home sanitation and

·         hygienic handling of food and meal preparation

NARO is at the forefront of bio-fortification enhancing nutrient quality of staple foods namely protein rich maize, iron rich beans, zinc in bananas, Vitamin A orange fleshed sweet potatoes among others. These high yielding crop varieties are being promoted in many communities to improve nutrition status of our people

Areas that face more serious hunger and nutrition challenges government has put a full range of nutrition interventions with national coverage and these require investment worth US$213 million over five years

·         Government has also committed Shs25 billion for relief food and is procuring 1,600 metric tonnes of maize flour and 1,400 metric tonnes of beans for 1.3 million refugees

·         UGX 14billion has been given to Karamoja by World Bank through NUFAS 3 under Disaster Risk Financing programs that transfer cash or food to households that participate in the public-works interventions.

·         Relief Aid worth UGX 22 billion worth 5,983 metric tons of Rice from China that is given out to food insecure households

·         NAADS/ Operation Wealth Creation (OWC) program that provides technologies to farming household countrywide to prevent future food crises

·         Government ministries, the World Bank, Food Agriculture Organization, World Food Program, UNICEF and 85 district local governments that have facilitated development and implementation of Five-year Hunger Eradication Action plans

·         Agriculture industrialization driven by Public- Private Sector Partnership or joint ventures under ASSP and NDP11 2015/16 -2019/20 is addressing growth of the sector and socio-economic transformation of the country. These among others include

·         The Vegetable Oil Palm Development project –which processes bio-fortified cooking oil

·         Soroti fruit factory to produce fruit pulp and packed juice

·         Tea factories – Global Tea factory and Kyamuhunga Tea factory with installed capacity of 3million kgs made tea

·         Coffee, milk and beef processing for exports, revival of fish processing facilities all contributing to putting a diverse range of food products on the market and changing consumer patterns and demand for safe foods.

The minister says a Zero Hunger World By 2030 Is Possible. Studies have shown a dollar invested in hunger prevention return between US$15 and US$139 in benefits. This is achievable if all stakeholder in the Agriculture sector and farming households play their roles to ensure food and nutrition security, household incomes and exports.

The United Nations General Assembly 1979 passed the resolution which urged governments, national, regional and international organizations to effectively commemorate World Food Day on 16^th October every year. 

It is also the same date when the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) was founded in Quebec, Canada in 1945. 

All countries of the world (194) draw attention to reflect on the status of food security, hunger, malnutrition and poverty.

2. Objectives of World Food Day are to:

·         Heighten awareness on hunger and food security issues

·         Promote yield enhancing technologies to increase productivity

·         Support technical cooperation among countries

·         Encourage participation of women, youth and marginalized groups in production and agricultural sector decision making

·         Strengthen National and International efforts in the struggle against hunger, malnutrition and poverty.