Influence of Social Inequalities on Dietary Diversity and Household Food Insecurity: An In-Depth Nutrition Baseline Survey Conducted in Madhya Pradesh, India.

Home to a significant proportion of the world's population, India is one of the hardest hit countries when it comes to malnutrition. While the magnitude of malnutrition in India is vast, it is also unevenly spread due to inequalities of the social, political, and economic situation. As part of the special initiative of the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), "One World - No Hunger," GIZ is implementing a Global Program on "Food and Nutrition Security, Enhanced Resilience" (FaNS) in 12 countries, including India. The GIZ FaNS program, in agreement with the Department of Food and Public Distribution, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution on a central level, and the Department of Women and Child Development in Madhya Pradesh, aims to improve food security and nutrition diversity for women in the reproductive age group (15-49 years) and young children (6-23 months) in the districts of Sheopur and Chhatarpur in Madhya Pradesh. The present study, conducted in the state of Madhya Pradesh in India, describes the nutrition situation of women and children belonging to disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds and aims to assess how underlying factors are influencing the nutrition diversity and food security situation. The findings highlight low dietary diversity with more than 80% of women and 77% of children consuming less than the daily recommended food groups. A high level of food insecurity (49.9%) was also reported in the study area (https://www.snrd-africa.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/GIZ_Nutrition-Baseline-Survey-Summary-Report.pdf). Furthermore, the study affirms that caste status negatively influences dietary diversity, especially among women and those with household food insecurity. A better educational status and income stability resulted in a better nutrition status for mothers and children. Access to food and nutrition services (OR 1.5; p = 0.04), exposure to nutrition counselling (OR 1.323; p = 0.001), and hygiene practices (OR 1.8; p = 0.002) can be instrumental in improving the dietary diversity and food security status of families, irrespective of prevailing inequalities.

Wholesome Nutrition: an example for a sustainable diet.

'Wholesome Nutrition' is a concept of sustainable nutrition that was developed at the University of Giessen in the 1980s. In this concept, health and the ecologic, economic, social and cultural dimensions of nutrition are equally important. In 1992 at the UN-Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro the definition of 'Sustainable Development' comprised the dimensions environment, economy and society. Additionally to these three 'classical' dimensions of sustainability, we included 'health' as the fourth dimension because nutrition has far reaching effects on human health. The fifth dimension, 'culture', became part of the sustainability dialogue since many years; the respective cultural background influences food habits. Presently, mankind has to cope with huge global challenges such as poverty and food insecurity in low-income countries as well as climate change. Therefore the objective is to identify prospects for actions to respond to these global challenges. The concept of 'Sustainable Nutrition' analyses the food supply chain at all stages from input-production and primary production to processing, distribution, preparation, consumption and waste disposal. The present analysis leads to the following seven principles: preference of plant-based foods, organic foods, regional and seasonal products, preference of minimally processed foods, Fair Trade products, resource-saving housekeeping and enjoyable eating culture. This concept is based on holistic thinking and has the potential to reduce the global challenges in the field of nutrition. Scientists, stakeholders, multipliers and consumers are asked to consider environmental, economic, social and cultural aspects in addition to the biological (health) aspects.