WCD's revised nutrition guidelines likely by Jul 31: Official

Revised nutrition guidelines prepared by the Women and Child Development Ministry are likely to be issued by this month end, its top official said today.
WCD Secretary Rakesh Srivastava said this while releasing the report of a four-year-long cohort study on early childhood education impact in India, conducted by the UNICEF in partnership with the Ambedkar University and NGO Pratham.
Responding to a question on the quality of food served at the Anganwadi centres under the WCD's Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) programme, the secretary said, "The revised nutrition guidelines are likely to be issued by July 31."
"We had set up a new committee which includes the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN). The panel has held its rounds of consultations with various stakeholders and some states have also been consulted. We hope it will be out soon after getting the final nod," he said.

He said there were 14 lakh Anganwadi centres across the country and the number of beneficiaries ran to 10 crore per day.
"But, around 33 per cent of these Anganwadi centres, which is about 4.5 lakh, are running at rented places which are unhygienic with poor ventilation and sanitation facilities," Srivastava said.

He said these Anganwadi centres would be shifted to the nearest primary schools with vacant space.
"That way, it would also be monitored by the headmaster of that school," the secretary said, adding the shifting would be done only to schools are located near these Anganwadi centres.
He said the WCD and the HRD ministries have recently issued a joint circular to this effect.

Srivastava said states such as Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh have done well in Annaganwadi management and their mode of functioning can be replicated in other parts of the country.
The India Early Childhood Education Impact Study took seven years in the making and Pratham's autonomous research and assessment unit, ASER, partnered in this project.
One of the major findings of the study is every seven out of 10 surveyed four-year-old children attend a preschool programme.
"With access no longer the main issue, India is well placed to invest in the quality of early childhood education," it said.
"The field study conducted from 2011-2015 followed a cohort of 14,000 four-year-olds from age 4-8 years in the rural areas of three states in the country. The states chosen were Assam, Rajasthan and Telangana," a senior official of ASER said.

Asked about the choice of states, she said, "These places offered different set ups and environment and, so, offered us different kinds of data to research on."
In cohort studies, the sample is observed over a period of time, and usually forward-looking - that is, they are prospective studies, or planned in advance.