Nigeria can’t end hunger without private sector input – GAIN

The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) has said that malnutrition cannot be eradicated in Nigeria, if the private sector is not assigned roles.

The National Coordinator, Scaling Up Nutrition Business Network (SBN), a programme supported by GAIN and the World Food Programme, Ms. Ibiso King-Harry, noted that Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) were key to improving nutrition.

According to her, to achieve this, SBN has established alliances to enhance the enabling environment for businesses in food and nutrition.

She disclosed that SBN was established as a global programme in 2012 to identify, organise and develop a network of companies in the nutrition space and support them in making positive contributions to nutrition.

The Country Director of GAIN, Dr. Michael Ojo, said over the five years, SBN Nigeria had delivered increased participation for the private sector in nutrition, adding that the country’s significant successes in improving nutrition had not ended the challenge of malnutrition.

He lamented that Nigerians were still consuming a very narrow range of foods.

“They are not eating enough of the right types of foods and are increasingly eating too much of the wrong types, with key indices of malnutrition such as stunting in children and micronutrient deficiencies in women of reproductive age,” he added.

Lamenting that most Nigerians buy the food they eat, but the available safe and nutritious foods were not adequately demanded and consumed by the people who need them the most, he asserted that post-harvest loss was prevalent and characterised by annual losses valued at $9 billion.