Forum demands funding, accountability to tackle malnutrition in Nigeria

A federal lawmaker and other stakeholders have called for increased resource allocation and accountability to tackle malnutrition challenge in the country. They made the call Tuesday in Abuja at the CASCADE Legislative Convening on Nutrition and Food Security for Bauchi, Jigawa, Kebbi, and Nasarawa States organised by CARE International Nigeria and Global Alliance for Improved […]

A federal lawmaker and other stakeholders have called for increased resource allocation and accountability to tackle malnutrition challenge in the country.

They made the call Tuesday in Abuja at the CASCADE Legislative Convening on Nutrition and Food Security for Bauchi, Jigawa, Kebbi, and Nasarawa States organised by CARE International Nigeria and Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN).

They attributed the challenges to weak accountability mechanisms, poor resource allocation, coordination challenges, and data gaps.

The Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Nutrition and Food Security, Hon. Chike Okafor, who called for increased budgetary commitment, efficient fund management and leveraging donor and private sector funding to strengthen resource allocation, also urged development partners and international NGOs to be transparent in their funding activities.

“Hunger and food insecurity is a time bomb and the key to ending malnutrition is effective legislative oversight, increased budgetary allocation to nutrition interventions at the federal, state and local government levels, and review of extant practices and laws that promote food insecurity, like the case of multiple taxation of food products on transit from one part of the country to another.

“For legislative oversight, we need stronger parliamentary committees’ presence to monitor nutrition commitments and expenditures and track budgetary allocations not only for those from the government but also those involving development partners. Unfortunately, there is a high level of opacity in the funding activities of development partners and international NGOs with regard to Nutrition Interventions in Nigeria. This is not the case in many other developing Countries.

“I urge these partners in Nigerian to show more transparency, and open their books for more scrutiny. We do not want to revoke our constitutional rights to get this done,” Okafor said.

While saying that there should be performance-based incentives to boost results, he said that rewarding local governments or agencies that meet nutrition targets is a more pragmatic motivator than current initiatives that reward poor performing states with poor nutrition indices by investing more funds there, akin to pouring water into a basket.

He said, “Whoever does well should be encouraged with more funding so that those who aren’t doing well could learn from their peers and sit up accordingly.”

Earlier, the Acting Country Director of CARE International Nigeria, Jennifer Orgle, who spoke on behalf of CARE and GAIN, siad that the CASCADE project was launched in 2023 to contribute to ending malnutrition among 1.1 million women of reproductive age and children under the age of 5 in Nigeria.

She commended the federal government for its commitment to ending malnutrition in the country.

“The Federal Government’s recent call to action in improving coordination, financing, and accountability in food and nutrition demonstrates its commitment to securing food and nutrition security for all, especially, women and children,” Orgle said.

She said despite advancements made, limited allocation of adequate funding by state governments for nutrition-sensitive interventions undermines the joint efforts to comprehensively address malnutrition.

The event tagged “Strengthening Policy Implementation and Action for a Resilient Food System to Improve Food and Nutrition Security’, has the broad objective of sharing information and reflect on the current status of the states’ food system in addressing malnutrition.

The convening also identified emerging trends and opportunities for increased accountability, as well as the responsiveness and allocation of resources for the implementation of nutrition-related policies and plans.