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Beaven Dhliwayo Features Writer
A coalition of civil society organisations known as the Zimbabwe Civil Society Organisations Scaling Up Nutrition Alliance (ZCSOSUNA) announced a joint campaign against malnutrition in the country.
The alliance, made of 119 members, launched a two-year strategic plan meant to engage parliamentarians, religious leadership, traditional leaders, adolescent girls, pregnant and lactating women, journalists and editors from both print and online media houses in a bid to ensure increased domestic financing, accountability and transparency for nutrition in the country.
The country needs to swiftly act and ensure there is increased resource allocation to nutrition. Globally, one in three people is malnourished in one form or another and about 815 million people, or one in 10 is suffering from chronic undernourishment.
The alliance over the two-year period will advocate for a three percent of the budget to be directed towards nutrition in the next three years. The 2015 East and Southern Africa Budget Analysis revealed that in Zimbabwe only, 0,45 percent is going towards nutrition.
It will also advocate for one specific budget line to be set aside for nutrition under vote 14 of Ministry of Health and Child Care.
The alliance targets that by the end of September 2020, the Government of Zimbabwe will mobilise domestic financial resources for the implementation of nutrition-sensitive plans.
The alliance also aims at strengthening multi-sectorial coordination and collaboration for integrated nutrition response and contribute to the body of knowledge on the socio-cultural influences on nutrition.
In its Food and Nutrition Security Policy’s Commitment 6, Government is committed to ensuring a national integrated food and nutrition security information system that provides timely and reliable information on the food and nutrition security situation and the effectiveness of programmes and informs decision making.
The various consequences of malnutrition are literally devastating. According to the World Health Organisation, an estimated 45 percent of deaths among children under age five are attributable to malnutrition.
Malnutrition and inadequate diet are now the largest risk factors responsible for the global burden of diseases.
The economic consequences represent losses of gross domestic product (GDP) year in and year out of 10 percent — far greater than the annual percentage loss in world GDP due to the global financial crisis of 2008-2010.
The costs of inaction are, therefore, unbearable; the stakes are high and so are the returns. The time to act is now because not doing so is complacency.
In an interview with The Herald on the sidelines of the launch, ZCSOSUNA national coordinator Kudakwashe Zombe said the project is aimed at strengthening civil society capacities and citizen voice as an effective way of ensuring improved nutrition governance and accountability in the country.
He is also optimistic that Government will be supportive on making good nutrition a reality for the children, families and communities that need it most.
“I am optimistic that the Government will take heed of the East and Southern Africa Civil Society Nutrition Network (ESA CSN)’s call for East and Southern African countries to increase their investment in nutrition to three percent of the national budget in the next three years,” says Zombe.
He also indicated that despite extraordinary returns on investment and high cost to benefit ratio, current Government spending on nutrition is inadequate to address the economic and human challenges of malnutrition and is insufficient to meet the nation’s ambitions of the 2013 Nutrition for Growth commitments.
“Government should reflect and report on progress made in honouring its nutrition for growth commitment of allocating $3,04 million towards nutrition interventions in 2013. In addition to that, the (National) Nutrition Department within Ministry of Health and Child Care and the Food and Nutrition Council should consider renewing the nation’s commitment in the forthcoming 2020 Nutrition for Growth Japan Summit.
Questioned why Zimbabwe should prioritise nutrition, Zombe said under-nutrition comes at a high human and economic cost.
“The economic costs of under-nutrition, in terms of lost national productivity and economic growth are significant.
“Collectively, the costs of poor nutrition represent an estimated loss of two to three percent of a country’s GDP, yet these losses can be as high as 16 percent,” says Zombe.
ZCSOSUNA called on the Government to invest in Zimbabwe’s human and economic development by allocating adequate budgetary resources to nutrition and recognising nutrition as a means to inclusive economic growth.
Investing in nutrition would help Zimbabwe’s children to develop into healthy and productive members of society.
Good nutrition enables children to develop healthy immune systems, reducing future spending on healthcare throughout their lives
Good nutrition unlocks children’s potential.
Children who get the right nutrition in their first 1 000 days — that is from conception until the age of two, will earn on average 21 percent more as adults.
Good nutrition is the key to Zimbabwe’s economic progress and social development and investing in nutrition can increase the country’s GDP by as much as 12 percent.
Childhood stunting is one of the most significant impediments to human development, globally affecting 151 million children under the age of five years according to a recent UNICEF, World Bank and WHO report.
According to this report, stunting is the devastating result of poor nutrition in utero and early childhood.
Children suffering from stunting may never attain their full possible height and their brains may never develop to their full cognitive potential.
Stunted children begin their lives at a marked disadvantage: they face learning difficulties in school, earn less as adults, and face barriers to participation in their communities.
In Zimbabwe, the prevalence of stunting in children less than five years of age is at 26 percent in 2018, which points to an improvement from 34 percent eight years ago, according to Reliefweb, a specialised digital service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
However, this progress is blunted by marked disparities among rural and urban areas and among rich and poor households.
About 28 percent (2,4 million people) of the rural population was projected to be food insecure during the peak hunger period (January to March 2019) in the 2018 ZimVAC Rural Livelihoods Assessment (RLA).
The urban population is not spared by the prevailing food and nutrition security challenges.
According to the 2018 Urban Livelihoods Assessment (ULA), 37 percent of the population in the urban areas could not meet their food needs, an increase from 31 percent in 2016.
Economic-related shocks and challenges such as cash shortages (64 percent), high food prices (57 percent), health and funeral expenses (31 percent), loss of employment (25 percent) and high fuel or transport costs (17 percent) were the major issues effecting urban communities (ULA, 2018).
It remains, nonetheless, encouraging to note that Zimbabwe is one of the 60 countries that are leading a global movement to end malnutrition in all its forms by 2025.
According to the Scale Up Nutrition report published at the end of 2017, Zimbabwe’s progress towards scaling-up nutrition stands at 70 percent.
This includes: Bringing people together (86 percent), coherent policy and legal framework (66 percent ), aligning programmes around a Common Results Framework (75 percent), financial tracking and resource mobilisation (52 percent).
This clearly shows that there is still much to be done.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 goals represent an unprecedented set of opportunities to make stronger commitments to nutrition.
The ambition to “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture” is captured in SDG 2.
In addition, at least 12 of the 17 goals contain indicators that are highly relevant to nutrition.
The SDGs commit all governments, including Zimbabwean one, to comprehensive, integrated and universal transformations, including ending hunger and malnutrition by 2030.
Government, in partnership with key stakeholders, will continue to support policies and measures that seek to promote maximum protection and development of children under the Transitional Stabilisation Programme, in line with the Constitution.
The Constitution provides for empowerment and equal opportunities for children in respect of the right to education, healthcare services, nutrition and shelter, consistent with Zimbabwe’s commitment under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child.
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