Deteriorating health problems and high infant and maternal mortality rates have necessitated further investigation if accepted norm of calorie intake is enough. It suggests nutritional status depends not only on the nutrient intake but also on non-nutrient food attributes. Therefore, nutritionists argue the assessment of malnutrition should be based on outcome measures (which are closely related to health and functional capacity) rather than input measures. Safeguarding poor from malnutrition requires providing increased consumption of a range of non-staple foods by allocating resources for investment in agricultural research, the result of which can help to improve nutrient content of food staples.
The Three-Year Interim Plan has attached topmost priority to rural areas, agriculture and construction. Construction of motorable roads and bridges in mid-western and far-western regions, mega projects like the hilly highway from Taplejung to Baitadi, standard airports in Nijgadh and Pokhara and improvements in Bhairahawa airport is expected to increase connectivity and size of the domestic market to contribute to reducing poverty. The only concern is implementation. This problem is not only political; it has broader ramifications with policy, governance and institutions. The degree of political vulnerability is expected to be more severe necessitating the redesigning of the conflict potential of development programs.
Nutrition safety net programs need strengthening by increasing program access and participation among low-income families. Even in the US, almost one in five poor children receive no nutrition assistance – Nepal’s challenge is to mainstream excluded poor and vulnerable into the safety nets because there is a significant variation in the level of development between the regions.
World Food Program in Nepal has conducted a Comprehensive Food Security and Vulnerability Analysis to find out food insecurity and vulnerability situation in rural households. Based on food consumption pattern, 27 percent of rural households are food insecure, 16 percent are very poor and 11 percent have poor food consumption pattern with minimum level of proteins.
Nepal’s per capita cereal crop fares better compared to most of the South Asian countries but domestic production growth in cereals lags behind population growth. Therefore, agriculture growth policies to increase domestic food supply and raise income is essential.
The households from far- and mid-western development regions of the country who are engaged in petty trade, unskilled wage labor, natural resources exploitation and handicrafts and farming are found to be food insecure (74 percent of households do not have adequate sanitation facilities – household vulnerability to food insecurity is contingent from two inter-related issues such as food access and food utilization).
Some attempts have been made to assess Nepal Hunger Index to find out Nepal’s position with regard to Global Hunger Index (GHI); Nepal ranks in the 57th position out of the world’s 88 countries. The index varies from 0 and 100. When the GHI is 20-29.9, the situation is alarming and if it is greater or equal to 30, it is extremely alarming. The prevalence of hunger in the far- and mid-western Hill and Mountain regions in this sense is extremely alarming. It suggests the need for initiating pilot project in selected remote areas to address the problem.
Availability alone does not guarantee food security. China, for instance, has 7 percent of world’s available land and feeds 22 percent of world’s population, but the gap in food production has been 15-20 million tons per annum (the reasons being natural calamities, reduction of available land, etc). Nepal’s per capita cereal crop fares better compared to most of the South Asian countries but domestic production growth in cereals lags behind population growth. Therefore, agriculture growth policies to increase domestic food supply and raise income is essential through the improvement in land productivity, which is comparatively low in Nepal.
In Nepal, public-private partnership has not yet materialized; public distribution system is poor; public sector interventions show no impact in improving food and nutrition status. The bottom-line is that while increased investments and technological breakthroughs can improve availability, it may not translate into increased accessibility and absorption of food.
After almost three quarters of macroeconomic difficulty, the level of gross foreign exchange reserve in Nepal improved gradually. World Economic Outlook, 2010 of the International Monetary Fund has given Nepal’s revised Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita at US$522. The key question is whether Nepal has been successful to improve the status of children and women with regard to maintaining food and nutritional security? The answer is “not really”.
The integrated health and nutrition program has not been very successful, which is so critical for nutritional security. For understanding the health outcomes, it is important to study correlation between the value of agriculture output per hectare/or ropani and malnutrition status at least in Nepal’s far- and mid-western Hill and Mountain regions. Malnutrition and food insecurity are the causes for high mortality rates in mothers and infants. Independent South Asian Commission on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA) shows over 48 percent of children under 5 suffered from malnutrition in the region while 24 percent of the population as a whole was below the minimum level of dietary energy consumption. It necessitates policies for increasing the efficiency of food markets, promotion of small-holder agriculture, efficient targeting of subsidies, strengthening input and output markets and the development of long-term sustainable food systems.
ISACPA has prepared SAARC Development Goals (SDGs) for the period 2007-2012 in the areas of Livelihood, Health, Education, and Environment with the total of 22 goals under each indicator. Goal 3, Livelihood SDG aims at ensuring adequate nutrition and dietary improvement for the poor. Since SDGs has been endorsed by the head of the governments of SAARC, the lobby to integrate Goal 3 into the development plan of SAARC member-countries is recommended.
Not only the quality of infrastructure but also the expenditure for infrastructure is very low. Nepal spends less than 1 percent of total GDP on infrastructure against 4.8 percent of India. Study shows that Nepal needs to invest US$3.44 billion (12.22 percent of GDP) for the period of 2008-2012 in order to achieve 8 percent growth rate. Widening regular expenditure, repayment of debts, administrative overheads and other recurrent expenditure take away more than 80 percent of government’s revenue. Recent problem of liquidity crunch may limit Nepal’s ability to comply with matching fund requirement while accessing external assistance by negatively affecting food availability, access and absorption.
As long as the households possess ability to generate sufficient income, access can be achieved without households being self-sufficient in food production. Therefore, commercializing agricultural sector activities and boosting farm incomes can reduce poverty and increase access to food and nutritional security.
bishwambher@yahoo.com
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