Ensuring Children’s Access to Nutrition
by Ada Zhang
“Good nutrition is the bedrock of child survival and development” (UNICEF). Many children are suffering from malnutrition. This problem can be seen everywhere we go now, as 1 in 3 children under the age of 5 is suffering from lack of nutrients and these can be seen as stunting, wasting and being overweight, which is an emerging issue. To ensure that all children grow up healthy, nutrition is part of the process without a doubt (UNICEF), The first step we need to take is provide food. Not just food, but nutritious food. However, to do that, first we need to make sure we have enough food for the world’s population. Then after, we are able to focus on ensuring that children are also receiving and maintaining a good balanced diet, especially in the first 1000 days (about 2 and a half years). If not, this can result in many problems later, which is why we need to help “provide children and young people with diets that are nutritious, safe, affordable and sustainable”(UNICEF 19).
What is Causing Under Nourishment?
There are many causes of under nourishment, the most noticeable and important cause is of course the access to food, but a crucial cause people are often missing is the diet. “Poor diets have lifelong impacts on their physical growth and brain development” (UNICEF 22). As said before, the first 1000 days are crucial, each stage is an important part of reaching the next. Beginning from breastfeeding in the first 6 months, to the infant’s ‘first foods’ starting from the age of 6 month. “However very few children are eating the diet that can help support rapidly growing body and brain” (UNICEF 21). Children who are fortunate enough to have access to many diverse foods are not valuing their prosperous source of nutrition, causing them not to meet the amount of nutrition their body needs. Not only are children not eating the essentials for their growth but so are many adolescents and adults. According to The State of the World’s Children 2019 report by UNICEF, very few adolescents are eating the required nutrients needed for their body such as fruits and vegetables, instead many are either replacing their meals with soft drinks and fast foods or regularly skipping their meals. Which is why we need to focus on spreading the importance of a healthy diet and how we can maintain one.
The Effect of Under Nourishment
The effects of malnutrition are scary, “More children and young people are surviving, but far too few are thriving” (UNICEF 18). This can be seen in the harms of the triple burden. First is undernutrition which includes stunting and wasting which can lead to poor cognition/schooling performance. Another one of the triple burdens is hidden hunger which is lack of micronutrients, this can affect in a poor immunity and tissue development and can even risk death. The last of the three is overweight, also known as obesity, and has both short- and long-term consequences, and all three have a damaging effect on growth development which can affect their health later (UNICEF 14). The start of all these problems can be caused from conception to adolescence, from mother’s nutritional status to access to clean, adequate sanitation (UNICEF 21).
Places where children are not growing well. via: UNICEF (2019). The State of the World’s Children 2019. Children, Food and Nutrition: Growing well in a changing world. UNICEF, New York.
From this data it shows us places where children are not growing well, the main spots seen are Africa and South Asia. The main problems these two places are facing is economy, from this data you can see the better economy places like North America, China, even Australia are average less than 10-19.9 percent. Nevertheless, places like Africa where their economy isn’t so high and has a large population can be seen not doing so well, especially since the pandemic hit.
What needs to be done
As the world is evolving faster and faster, so is its increase in population. Which means we need to be able to produce the amount of food satisfy everyone, from urban city to rural towns. This means to ensure everyone gets food we need to increase agricultural production and sustainable food production (UNSDG). However, this goal was set in 2019, now according to Action Against Hunger who got information from the UNSDG Goal 2 “Around the world, more than enough food is produced to feed the global population” but still about 9.9 percent of the world is still hungry. Reminding everyone that 9.9 percent is an increase from the estimated percentage of people that are hungry back in 2019, which was 8.9 percent and not to mention in 2019 it was estimated that if we don’t try to stop this in 2030, world hunger would pass 9.8 percent of the world’s population (UNSDG). If you haven’t noticed now, we have already surpassed what we would reach in 2030 and it is only 2022 now.
As we are already producing enough food for everyone, many in fact over 800 million are still hungry. A big impact that has affected this would be the relatively recent hit of Covid-19 and the outburst of the war between Ukraine and Russia. Not only these, but a very major cause is also food wastage. According to research from an organization Blessings of Hope shows that statistics say about 40% of the food produced in America is never eaten. All is going to waste and if we recover half of that food for the people who don’t have the access could rapidly reduce world hunger and malnutrition.
Healthy-Hunger Free Kids Act
This act started in 2010 in school in America “to help reduce America’s childhood obesity epidemic and reduce health risks for America’s children by helping schools across the country produce balanced meals so children had access to healthy foods during the school day. (USDA)” The results of this were very successful, not only did they get more children to eat more healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables during lunch, but they also got over many schools across the country meeting the nutritional standards for children. Now more schools are participating in this act which is a great step towards improving children’s access to nutrition.
food bank of Northeastern New York. via:https://regionalfoodbank.net/food-bank-memo-regarding-covid-19/
Food Banks
Food Banks are all over the world, there are many organizations providing homeless, hungry families and children with food. Helping people meet the basics of three meals per day. Food Banks also welcome volunteering and donations from anyone, meaning we can help too.
Coming together
According to the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals, urges for each country to meet the nutrient needs of their population first, and as far as Covid-19 is still happening to keep global food trades going and keep domestic supply chains moving. Additionally, to also support small business farmers’ food productivity, all this can help with reducing world hunger. Most importantly to raise attention to the children’s interest in the food system as it is often left out (UNICEF). Despite that, there is still a downside of this. Overproducing food has a very bad impact on the environment since to produce and harvest food we need energy and the wasted food that goes to landfill causes more greenhouse gases which is another issue we need to solve.
As seen above, there are already many problems causing not only children, but adolescence to not gaining the nutrients they need. To make the world a better place for the next generations and generations to come, we can start with knowing and educating more people on the importance of a healthy diet, the benefits of nutrients, and the advantages it has on our body and mind. At the same time this can also help put more focus on solving this problem locally and globally in the future.
Works Cited:
“End World Hunger in Our Lifetime.” Blessings of Hope, blessingsofhope.com/end-hunger/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIi9iE8YGe-AIVCcFMAh0z5wxMEAAYASAAEgI9z_D_BwE.
Fact Sheet: Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act School Meals Implementation. , 2014. SIRS Issues Researcher, https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2250300016?accountid=4047.
Frequently Asked Questions About a Healthy Diet. , 2005. SIRS Issues Researcher, https://explore.proquest.com/sirsissuesresearcher/document/2250553104?accountid=4047.
“Nutrition.” unicef, New York: UNICEF, 1993., www.unicef.org/nutrition. Accessed 25 May 2022.
“Nutritional Standards.” Department of Education, www.education-ni.gov.uk/articles/nutritional-standards. Accessed Sept. 2020.
The Sustainable Development Goals Report. United Nations Statistics Division Development Data and Outreach Branch, Mar. 2016, unstats.un.org/sdgs/report/2016/Overview/. Accessed 5 May 2022.
UNICEF for Every Child. UN General Assembly, 6 Oct. 1953, www.unicef.org/. Accessed 5 May 2022.
UNICEF (2019). The State of the World’s Children 2019. Children, Food and Nutrition: Growing well in a changing world. UNICEF, New York.
UNICEF. UNICEF programming guidance: Prevention of overweight and obesity in children and adolescents. New York: UNICEF, 2019.
“World Hunger: Key Facts and Statistics 2022.” Action against Hunger, www.actionagainsthunger.org/world-hunger-facts-statistics.