J-K: Advisor Farooq Khan inaugurates POSHAN Maah-2019

Advisor to Governor, Farooq Khan on Monday here called for making unified efforts to combat the menace of malnutrition in order to make the country healthy and prosperous.

"It is very unfortunate that even after 70 years of independence, children are malnourished. This is happening because children are not properly fed and the pregnant mothers are not taking a proper diet during pregnancy. These children are directly connected with the future of the country. We must all make efforts to combat the crisis," he said while addressing an inaugural event of POSHAN Maah-2019 as part of Jan Andolan under POSHAN Abhiyaan held at Convention Centre here.

During the programmes, the participants were also made aware of the issues such as optimal breastfeeding, anaemia prevention in children, adolescent girls, food fortification and micronutrients.

The other speakers such as Deputy Director, ICDS, Jammu, Atul Kumar Gupta and State Project Director, POSHAN Abhiyaan, Shabnam Shah Kamili also talked about the issues such as hygiene sanitation, safe drinking water, diarrhea management, full immunization and promotion with the attendees.

POSHAN Abhiyaan (National Nutrition Mission) was launched by the government on March 8, 2018. The target of the mission is to bring down stunting among children in the age group 0-6 years from 38.4 per cent to 25 per cent by 2022. The program would ensure service delivery and interventions by use of technology, behavioural change through convergence and lays-down specific targets to be achieved across different monitoring parameters.

According to the Registrar General of India, in 2010, under-five mortality in India was 59 per 1,000 live births, one of the highest in the world. Besides that, in 2012, Save the Children, an NGO, reported that 1.83 million Indian children die every year before they turn five and pinned malnutrition as the key reason for the deaths.