Nutrition Financing Ep37: Investing in Nutrition: A Key to Africa’s Future and Global Progress
It is a wish that I believe you have to see a world where every child is born healthy, where every mother receives the care she needs, and where no one suffers the devastating effects of hunger or malnutrition. While commendable progress has been made globally, with child stunting rates declining by 44% since 1990, challenges persist.
In 2022, 148 million children were still stunted. In addition, one in seven children globally was born with low birth weight in 2020 and 45 million suffered from wasting. The condition impairs their growth, health, development, and education and has long-term consequences for their future well-being.
When you quickly do a scan around the communities, undernourished children face the challenges of performing well compared to their healthy peers. This is something that if not intervened on time through creating means to access sufficient nutritious food, can lead to an intergenerational vicious cycle of malnutrition and poverty.
At the same time, close to 45% of adults worldwide were overweight or obese, with many of these challenges rooted in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), affecting more than 70% in 2022, including Sub-Saharan Africa.
The World Bank's Investment Framework for Nutrition 2024, particularly showcases the latest statistics and underscores the need for significant additional investment to address nutrition concerns whilst also offering innovative finance alternatives. You can no longer sideline conversation on funding nutrition if you expect better nutrition outcomes in the communities around you.
Africa at the Heart of the Nutrition Challenge
You have witnessed droughts and other catastrophes caused by climate change cause havoc to food security. The impacts are projected to increase wasting and underweight by almost 50%, putting further strain on vulnerable countries that are already overburdened by nutrition concerns. Without urgent action, the region risks losing trillions in economic productivity due to malnutrition.
To improve nutrition outcomes, an extra $128 billion will need to be invested globally over the following decade (2025-2034) to scale up evidence-based nutrition interventions. Low- and lower-middle-income nations, particularly those in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, bear the lion's share of the burden of poor nutrition outcomes, accounting for more than three-quarters of the finance needs.
Whereas large investments are required, the annual costs are only $13 per pregnant woman and $17 per child under the age of five, which is an acceptable price for making up for saving lives and supporting a productive workforce. Inaction has an even deeper financial cost, estimated at $41 trillion over a decade.
Combating undernutrition safeguards the human capital that countries require to expand their economies. As a result, effective nutrition interventions might provide up to $2.4 trillion in economic benefits over the same period, with each dollar invested returning an estimated $23. Equally important obesity prevention would increase labor market productivity at a reduced yearly cost of roughly $3.5 per capita.
Key Areas Where You Can Make a Difference: Innovative Financing for Nutrition
Improving nutrition outcomes necessitates creative finance strategies and a diverse strategy. Measures like incorporating nutrition into primary health interventions and safety net programs, repurposing agricultural subsidies for healthy diets, and leveraging climate funding. Non-traditional financing methods, such as sovereign wealth funds or social bonds, can also assist governments in raising additional cash to meet their nutrition targets. Strategic partnerships are necessary to ensure such resources are channeled to nutrition programs that seek to enhance preventive solutions and capacity-build communities to be self-reliant.
FSPN Africa is committed to leading by leveraging digital tools in agrifood systems to deliver sustainable and nutrition-sensitive solutions. However, more funding is needed to ensure the solutions attain lasting impact in the communities.
To catalyze significant private sector investment in food and nutrition security, metrics, advocacy, catalytic capital embedded in multilateral development bank communities, and strategic capital must be combined by incentivizing and encouraging companies and investors to invest in the food systems of today and tomorrow.
With this in place, private sector investment groups will pivot to nutrition-positive investments, as you have observed with climate investment initiatives. The key here is to educate investors on the return potential of investing in nutrition, not simply to address an investment returns perspective but also to increase labor productivity in the private and public sectors with better nutrition. These can be combined with policies that encourage healthy eating habits and communication campaigns, as well as attempts to improve the cost-effectiveness of nutrition programs. No child deserves to sleep hungry. Mothers deserve access to quality and suffient nutritious foods.
The stakes are high, but so are the rewards. You can help build a healthier, more prosperous Africa by acting today. It is time to pay attention to nutrition funding more than ever. The numbers mentioned above need to go down. The path to global progress starts with you. Let’s ensure that no community is held back by preventable malnutrition. Are you ready to make a difference?
References
World Bank Investment Framework for Nutrition 2024
Shekar, Meera, Jakub Kakietek, Julia Dayton Eberwein, and Dylan Walters. 2017. An Investment Framework for Nutrition: Reaching the Global Targets for Stunting, Anemia, Breastfeeding, and Wasting. Directions in Development. Washington, DC: World Bank. https://doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-1010-7.
For more information, contact info@fspnafrica.org