New Delhi, 12 October: In the Global Hunger Index 2023 report, India has been ranked 111th among 125 countries. The Ministry of Women and Child Development has described the index as an inaccurate measure of hunger.
The ministry has said that this does not reflect the actual situation in India. It has a number of serious methodological shortcomings. Three of the four indicators used to calculate this index relate to the health of children, so they cannot definitively reflect the health of the entire population. The fourth and most important indicator ‘Proportion of Population Undernourished (POU)’ is based on a public opinion survey conducted on a very small sample size of 3000.
The ministry said in a statement issued on Thursday that under Mission Saksham Anganwadi and Nutrition 2.0 (Mission Nutrition 2.0), several key activities have been prioritized to tackle the challenge of malnutrition. Developed and implemented ‘Nutrition Tracker’ ICT application. More than 13.96 lakh Anganwadi centers have been registered, benefitting more than 10.3 crore beneficiaries, including pregnant women, lactating mothers, children below 6 years of age and adolescent girls.
The nutrition tracker incorporates WHO’s expanded tables, which provide day-based Z-scores of stunting, wasting, underweight and obesity status based on the child’s height, weight, sex and age.
Anganwadi workers have been trained by medical professionals at the district level to measure growth parameters in Anganwadi centers and through World Bank Bill, Melinda and Gates Foundation etc., for which growth measurement tools have been provided in every Anganwadi in the country. .
According to the ministry, many leading international organizations like UNICEF, WHO and World Bank have acknowledged Nutrition Tracker as a game-changer in the field of nutrition.
The World Bank and UNICEF have collaborated closely with the Ministry to assist in operationalizing the Nutrition Tracker. Since April 2023, measurement data for children under 5 uploaded to the nutrition tracker has increased continuously.
The number of children increased from 6.34 crore in April 2023 to 7.24 crore in September 2023. The nutrition tracker has consistently remained below 7.2 percent month-on-month, compared to the value of 18.7 percent used to calculate child wasting in the Global Hunger Index 2023.
Since April 2023, measurement data for children under 5 years uploaded to the nutrition tracker has grown steadily β from 6.34 crore (63.4 million) in April 2023 to 7.24 crore (72.4 million) in September 2023.
