Kaduna to domesticate FG’s strategy on food security, nutrition

Nutrition

By Ezra Musa

Kaduna, March. 19, 2020 (NAN) The Kaduna State Government has begun the process of domesticating the Federal Government strategy on the Agricultural Sector, Food Security and Nutrition Strategy (AFSNS) to address the problem of malnutrition.

Hajiya Halima Lawal, Commissioner for Agriculture, made this known on Thursday at a 3-day workshop on the domestication of Agricultural Sector Food Security and Nutrition Strategy in Kaduna.

She said the aim of the workshop is to look into the national document for adoption by the state, to strengthen the fight against malnutrition.

The commissioner said the domestication would help to align the different budget line items of the state agriculture development plans with the eight strategic priority areas of the AFSNS.

“This would make it easy for the state to implement programmes with defined goals and contribute data for reporting on agreed indicators of the AFSNS,” she said.

On his part, Adeyinka Onabolu, Senior adviser on food security and nutrition to the Minister of Agriculture, said the domestication of the strategy would ensure  food security and balanced diet to check stunted growth and other challenges, especially among women and children.

She said the AFSNS provides the frame work for addressing the problems of food and nutrition insecurity at all levels in the country.

“The goal of the plan is to attain optimal nutritional status for all Nigerians through accelerating the scaling-up of priority of high impact nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions.

“Each state has to implement within their context to ensure that the agriculture sector actually is able to influence food security and good nutrition,” she said.

The special adviser  said research had proved that when a woman has an increase in income there is likelihood that it will reflect on what the family eats and their welfare unlike men with different priorities.

She called for more collaborative efforts to sustain the success being recorded in improving the nutrition status of women and children below five years. (NAN)

EMZ/OSA/MZA 

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Edited by Shittu Obassa/Maharazu Ahmed