Children malnourishment - A policy failure! Part-I
Children are the future of a nation. In our country 20 percent children (under the age of five) are wasted due to acute under nutrition and 48 percent are stunted due to chronic under nutrition. What future are we heading towards?
“ALL HUMAN beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.” So begins the universal declaration of Human Rights established 60 years ago that is celebrated even today around the globe. This year’s theme is non-discrimination. The one billion plus population of India includes158 million children that fall under the age group of 0 to 6 years. India being one of the fastest growing economies in the world, gave an output of 7.9% (rate of growth) of the GDP in the economically weak year of 2008-09. This represents the sheer contrast in governmental planning.
According to the Economic Survey 2007-08, industrial manufacturing, construction and communications were the leading sectors which lead to the acceleration in growth during the Tenth Five Year Plan which made larger influences on the urban sector neglecting the rural portion of our country. Whereas there India saw a decline in the share of agriculture in GDP as the scale went down from 24 percent in 2001-02 to 17.5 per cent in 2007-08.
India is largely known as an agricultural country with a considerable contribution to the country’s GDP coming from that sector. However, the decreasing food crop production and the regular import of the basic food amenities like sugar, wheat, rice etc. display the real picture of the weak and unsophisticated governmental policies. Though it is true that the new HYV’s, improved technology and better buffer stock situation have added stars to India’s global food production rate the lot of the population here has seen no improvement. Problems like unemployment (rose from 2.8 per cent to 3.1 percent from 1999-2000 to 2004-05), public ration distribution system (with high rates of corruption), incorrect feeding practices and share of food distribution in the family, rising prices of food grain, residential location (urban, rural, tribal area and remote area), social group (belonging to SC’s or ST’s status), mother’s education (able educated to take good care of herself and her child), lack of family planning and migration status are other contributing factors versatile enough to create obstacles in the path of a well nourished society.
Taking a closer look at the infant mortality rate in India, the recent data shockingly reveals that out of every 1000 children born in India, 57 are dead. In addition, the neonatal mortality rate is 39/1000 live births. The stark reality is that almost one in every three babies in the world who die before they are four weeks old is from India. Whereas the Maternal Mortality Rates (MMR) per 100,000 live births ranges from 300 to 600, with a median rate of 450. From the figures, the situation that emerges is not very encouraging.
Top nutritionists reveal that as compared to food availability, the poor families on the sub-continent face a greater problem in bringing it on the table due to the lack of money, time and energy. The issue of underweight children is particularly serious in rural areas and among poorer families, ethnic minorities, lower castes and other socially marginalized groups. Contributing factors are poor hygiene and extreme patriarchy which deprives females. India, even after 63 years of independence, stands amongst the countries where childhood malnutrition/ under- nutrition is severe. Sadly, it still continues to feature in the list of 20 countries with the highest burden of under-nutrition.
Failure of National Maternity Benefit Scheme, Janani Suraksha Yojana, NREGA, and ICDS were due to wrong policy implementation on the ground. Women as a whole largely remain the sufferer of the bad implementation of policy. Amongst all the different reasons, ugly social practices leading to early marriage of girls act as a slippery slope causing malnutrition among children. It is still an astonishing reality that a great proportion of women, who were married before the recommended age of 18 years, is about 53 per cent in rural areas (among the surveyed in the three NFHS) even in 2005. As a result these child mothers have their children even before they reach 20 years of age. On disaggregating underweight statistics upon gender consideration, the NFHS- 3 report shows that early marriage was higher among girls (48.9 per cent) than boys (45.5 per cent).
A common myth also says that Indian children are far better nourished than most African children. According to A.K. Shiv Kumar, some 47 per cent of Indian children below the age of three years are malnourished as compared to Sub-Saharan Africa (average 30 per cent). Along with this, the same statistics also reports that thirty out of 37 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have lower levels of child malnutrition than India. Surprisingly Bihar (54 per cent), Orissa (54 per cent) and Madhya Pradesh (55 per cent) report higher malnutrition rates than the maximum reported in Sub-Saharan Africa by Angola (51 per cent). Citizens of India must question this the unconcerned attitude of the government!
India is largely known as an agricultural country with a considerable contribution to the country’s GDP coming from that sector. However, the decreasing food crop production and the regular import of the basic food amenities like sugar, wheat, rice etc. display the real picture of the weak and unsophisticated governmental policies. Though it is true that the new HYV’s, improved technology and better buffer stock situation have added stars to India’s global food production rate the lot of the population here has seen no improvement. Problems like unemployment (rose from 2.8 per cent to 3.1 percent from 1999-2000 to 2004-05), public ration distribution system (with high rates of corruption), incorrect feeding practices and share of food distribution in the family, rising prices of food grain, residential location (urban, rural, tribal area and remote area), social group (belonging to SC’s or ST’s status), mother’s education (able educated to take good care of herself and her child), lack of family planning and migration status are other contributing factors versatile enough to create obstacles in the path of a well nourished society.
Taking a closer look at the infant mortality rate in India, the recent data shockingly reveals that out of every 1000 children born in India, 57 are dead. In addition, the neonatal mortality rate is 39/1000 live births. The stark reality is that almost one in every three babies in the world who die before they are four weeks old is from India. Whereas the Maternal Mortality Rates (MMR) per 100,000 live births ranges from 300 to 600, with a median rate of 450. From the figures, the situation that emerges is not very encouraging.
Top nutritionists reveal that as compared to food availability, the poor families on the sub-continent face a greater problem in bringing it on the table due to the lack of money, time and energy. The issue of underweight children is particularly serious in rural areas and among poorer families, ethnic minorities, lower castes and other socially marginalized groups. Contributing factors are poor hygiene and extreme patriarchy which deprives females. India, even after 63 years of independence, stands amongst the countries where childhood malnutrition/ under- nutrition is severe. Sadly, it still continues to feature in the list of 20 countries with the highest burden of under-nutrition.
Failure of National Maternity Benefit Scheme, Janani Suraksha Yojana, NREGA, and ICDS were due to wrong policy implementation on the ground. Women as a whole largely remain the sufferer of the bad implementation of policy. Amongst all the different reasons, ugly social practices leading to early marriage of girls act as a slippery slope causing malnutrition among children. It is still an astonishing reality that a great proportion of women, who were married before the recommended age of 18 years, is about 53 per cent in rural areas (among the surveyed in the three NFHS) even in 2005. As a result these child mothers have their children even before they reach 20 years of age. On disaggregating underweight statistics upon gender consideration, the NFHS- 3 report shows that early marriage was higher among girls (48.9 per cent) than boys (45.5 per cent).
A common myth also says that Indian children are far better nourished than most African children. According to A.K. Shiv Kumar, some 47 per cent of Indian children below the age of three years are malnourished as compared to Sub-Saharan Africa (average 30 per cent). Along with this, the same statistics also reports that thirty out of 37 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have lower levels of child malnutrition than India. Surprisingly Bihar (54 per cent), Orissa (54 per cent) and Madhya Pradesh (55 per cent) report higher malnutrition rates than the maximum reported in Sub-Saharan Africa by Angola (51 per cent). Citizens of India must question this the unconcerned attitude of the government!
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