Nutrition
Global Nutrition Report 2024 indicates that almost 40 percent of the world’s stunted (short-for-age) children under the age of 5 and nearly 50 percent of the wasted (low weight-for-height) children live in India. This is despite the fact that India is one of the world’s fastest growing economies. The prevalence of malnutrition in Maharashtra is equally high; significant positive action is needed to address it. This disconnect between economic achievement and human development raises an important concern as to whether the public policy framework in the country has created an inclusive and enabling environment, which could contribute towards substantive nourishing of human potential. Maharashtra government have accorded high priority to combating under-nutrition; yet, the levels of under-nutrition remain persistently high with significant regional disparities.
SAMARTHAN focuses on analyzing the efforts of the State governments to address the problem of under-nutrition in the country. Adopting a multi-sectoral approach to deal with the issue, covering both the nutrition-specific as well as nutrition-sensitive interventions, we examine the policy framework, budget outlays and implementation of interventions for improving nutrition.
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A number of concerns have been raised with regard to the limited effectiveness of prevailing levels of budgetary spending on nutrition due to ineffective utilization of funds in government programmed and gaps in service delivery. In this context, SAMARTHAN is also generating evidence on the gaps and better practices across States. Moreover, given the deficits in the nutritional attainments of disadvantaged sections of the population, like Scheduled Tribes, we are also working on Maharashtra’s grass-roots areas and also the role of policies and budgetary resources towards improving the nutritional status of the vulnerable sections.