World Food Day 2024: Understanding Malnutrition And Its Impact

World Food Day is a UN designated day that is annually observed on October 16, this day presents an opportunity to highlight global issues related to hunger and malnutrition as well as its effects on people and the planet. This year’s theme is 'Rights to foods for a better life and a better future', which promotes the importance of combating malnutrition along with combating hunger around the world.

What Is World Food Day 2024 About?

Combating malnutrition requires food to consist of diversity, nutrition, safety and affordability. It is necessary to have a greater diversity of nutritious food available to people in their fields, markets and homes.

Over 2.8 billion people in the world are unable to afford a healthy diet. Such unhealthy diets are the leading cause of various forms of malnutrition such as undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies and obesity, which now exist in most countries, cutting across socio-economic classes. Yet today, too many people suffer from hunger and are unable to afford healthy diets. More vulnerable people are often forced to rely on staple foods or less expensive foods that can be unhealthy, while others suffer from the unavailability of fresh or varied foods, lack the information they need to choose a healthy diet, or simply opt for convenience.

Years of data has proven that hunger and malnutrition is further aggravated through prolonged crises such as conflict, extreme weather conditions and economic shocks. These factors influence the world's agricultural systems that are vulnerable to disasters and crises, especially related to change in environmental factors. These factors include climate change, pollution, soil degradation, greenhouse

History Of World Food Day

World Food Day was established in November 1979 by the member countries of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This decision was ratified by the UN General Assembly on December 5, 1980, and urged governments and international, national and local organisations to contribute to celebrating World Food Day. Since 1981, World Food Day has been held every year.

Importance of World Food Day

Food is recognised as the third most basic human necessity and is considered to be a basic human right under the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights and two legally binding international covenants. Farms around the world produce enough food to feed the global population yet 10 per cent of the world population is affected by hunger. World Food Day emphasises the importance of food and helps promote Food and Agriculture Organization’s mission to end world hunger and improve the standard of living for people living in rural areas. This day also serves as a reminder for NGOs as well as people around the world that hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition are among the most pressing issues of our time and are getting worse the closer we get to the 2030 goal of Zero Hunger.

World Food Day 2024 particularly highlights the importance of malnutrition as with the advancement of food production and processing, it has become vital for people to not only eat to stave off hunger but also eat correctly to maintain their health for continued survival.

What is Malnutrition?

The World Health Organization (WHO) refers to malnutrition as deficiencies or excesses in nutrient intake, imbalance of essential nutrients or impaired nutrient utilisation. This condition rises from inadequate intake of vital nutrients essential for optimal health, growth, and development within an individual’s diet. Malnutrition can primarily be categorised as undernutrition, micronutrient related malnutrition and obesity. The double burden of overnutrition and undernutrition can be categorised in four main categories of undernutrition, micronutrition related malnutrition, obesity and diet related noncommunicable diseases (NCDs).

Different Types of Malnutrition

- Undernutrition – relates to the different states of the human body due to lack of food and can broadly manifest in four forms of wasting, stunting, underweight and deficiencies in vitamins and minerals. Wasting is defined as having low weight for height, which often indicates recent and severe weight loss that can also persist for a long time. Stunting is defined as having low height for one’s age and is the result of chronic or recurrent undernutrition. Underweight is usually referred to children that have low weight for their age, such children may be wasted, stunted or both.

- Micronutrient related malnutrition – relates to deficiencies of vitamins and minerals that are essential for body functions such as producing enzymes, hormones and other substances needed for growth and development. Amongst these, deficiencies of Iodine, vitamin A, and iron are considered to be the most important in global public health terms as their deficiency represents a major threat to the health and development of populations worldwide, particularly children and pregnant women in low-income countries.

- Obesity – refers to when a person is too heavy for his or her height due to abnormal or excessive fat accumulation that is harmful to their health. People with this condition face health risks of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes.

- Diet related non communicable diseases (NCDs) – largely refers to cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and strokes, often linked with high blood pressure, it also refers to certain cancers and diabetes. The primary risk factors for these diseases are unhealthy diet and inadequate nutrition.

Malnutrition in India

Global Hunger Index (GHI) is a tool that attempts to measure and track hunger globally as well as by region and by country. GHI 2024 ranks India 105th out of the 127 countries with a score of 27.3 in the 2024 Global Hunger Index which indicates that India has a serious level of hunger throughout the country. India’s GHI score is primarily based on four factors of undernourishment, child stunting, child wasting and child mortality. Based on this assessment data; 13.7 per cent of the population is undernourished, 35.5 per cent of children under five are stunted, 18.7 per cent of children under five are wasted and 2.9 per cent of children die before their fifth birthday.

To combat hunger and malnutrition, Prime Minister Modi had launched Rashtriya Poshan Abhiyaan in 2018 to address malnutrition by focusing on the nutritional status of pregnant women, lactating mothers, adolescent girls, and children up to the age of six. Poshan Maah 2024 in September marked a nationwide celebration dedicated to promoting nutrition awareness and driving action towards building a healthier India. Poshan Maah 2024 is engaging with adolescent girls to gain support for their healthcare programs and leveraging community participation to better improve the effects and reach of their programs.