11 May 2010

Better Nutrition to Improve Lives in the Developing World

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton

By Merle David Kellerhals Jr.
Staff Writer

Washington — The United States is trying to make global nutrition the intersection of economic development efforts to strengthen health systems of partner countries and to improve agricultural programs from farms to markets, says Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

“Nutrition is a universal need, and people of all ages and circumstances deserve access to nutritious foods,” Clinton said in a May 11 speech at CARE’s 2010 National Conference in Washington. CARE is a leading humanitarian organization that fights global poverty.

“We can save lives, we can help children start life on a better path, and we can bolster economic development and learning down the road,” she added.

Clinton announced during her first days in office that development would be one of the three pillars of President Obama’s foreign policy and national security programs.

“Our goal is to help our partners — partner countries, partner organizations, partner individuals — build their own capacity to provide citizens with the essentials like food, water, health care, education, economic opportunity, jobs, credit, responsive and accountable public institutions,” Clinton told the CARE conference.

Different communities face different challenges — in some it’s a lack of affordable protein-rich foods, and in others it’s chronic digestive disease caused by unsafe drinking water, she said. To succeed in addressing nutritional needs, economic development efforts must be focused on partner countries’ specific needs.

The United States is attempting to reduce child undernutrition by 30 percent in its partner countries, employing the efforts of two key initiatives, Clinton said. President Obama has launched the Global Health Initiative, a six-year, $63 billion program to strengthen health systems in partner countries, and the Feed the Future program, a three-year, $3.5 billion initiative aimed at improving agricultural systems from farms to markets.

“We’re trying to make nutrition the intersection of two major new policy initiatives,” Clinton said. “So as our partner countries devise national strategies to fight undernutrition, we will help carry them out.”

Part of this approach involves education about nutrition for farmers and parents, so that they understand the nutritional value of a diverse diet and mothers will understand the benefits of good feeding practices during their child’s first two years, she said.

Nutrition plays a critical role in a person’s life during a narrow period of time — the first 1,000 days, which begin at the start of a pregnancy and continue through the second year of life. Clinton said nutrition during those first 1,000 days can help determine whether a mother and child will survive pregnancy and whether a child will contract common childhood diseases and experience normal brain development to be able to attend school and eventually hold a job as an adult.

Another aspect of this program is to increase the amount and diversity of food grown, improve markets so that people have access to the food, and increase income levels so consumers can buy more and better-quality food, Clinton said.

Other measures include providing pregnant women iron supplements to prevent anemia and giving children oral rehydration salts to manage digestive illness, she said.

“For want of these basic treatments, millions of people die every year. These deaths are intolerable because they are preventable,” Clinton said.

(This is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)