Daily Times

QUETTA – Balochistan Minister for Planning and Development Dr Hamid Khan Achakzai on Thursday said that the provincial government would make nutrition its top priority.

While speaking at an advocacy seminar organised by the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN), National Fortification Alliance (NFA) and the provincial nutrition cell, he said that his ministry would make efforts under the “Scaling Up Nutrition” (SUN) initiative with support from partners to address the issue of malnutrition in the province.

He said that engagement with the private sector, including flour and oil mills, was important and should be utilised to address the impact of malnutrition in the province. He urged the mill owners to fortify staple food items, including wheat flour and edible oil.

On the occasion, Member National Assembly (MNA) Abdul Qahar Wadan, a member of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Health, said that nutrition was a high priority issue and a part of the Vision 2025 plan.

He said that the federal health ministry had been working on food fortification for several years and claimed that it was a cost-effective measure to address malnutrition. Food fortification would help bring about improvement in nutritional status of women and children, he added.

Member Provincial Assembly (MPA) Nasrullah Zeray said that malnutrition was a serious issue both in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Dr Baseer Khan Achakzai, the director of National Food Authority, said that it was encouraging to see that Balochistan’s parliamentarians were aware of the issue and were supporting fortification of food.

The GAIN country director Sajjad Imran explained the Regional Food Fortification Project which focused on the production and distribution of fortified wheat flour and edible oil/ghee to people in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Afghanistan. He said that the project would be implemented in the two provinces with cooperation from the private sector.

According to Dr Ali Nasir Bugti, nutrition indicators in Balochistan were poor. He said that a survey conducted by the federal health department and the Aga Khan university hospital showed that 16 per cent of the children faced serious nutrition problems, with 40 per cent of them falling in the low weight category and 52 per cent being shorter in height in comparison to other children of their age.

The report further claimed that 54.9 per cent of women and 73.5 per cent of children were deficient in Vitamin A while 48.9pc of women and 56.8per cent of children were deficient in iron in Balochistan.