NEW DELHI — Children in the village of Unsar, a scattering of thatched huts in the flood-prone Muzaffarpur district of Bihar, have one thing in common. They all display telltale signs of malnutrition: wasted and stunted frames and discolored patches of unkempt and wiry hair. Nearly 55% of children under 5 in this north Indian state are chronically underweight. They are in the front line of India's struggle to lower a malnutrition rate that is nearly double that of sub-Saharan Africa.Malnutrition afflicts 60 million children in India, imposing social and economic costs that are hard to overstate. In a report released this month, the World Bank urged the government to overhaul its flagging child welfare program, Integrated Child Development Services, the largest in the world. "Progress in reducing the proportion of undernourished children in India has been modest and slower than what has been achieved in other countries with comparable socioeconomic indicators," the World Bank said."Things are fine here," said Sunita Kumari, who oversees the filthy ICDS-run drop-in center in Unsar. But she admits nervously that the tattered register containing the all-important weight-to-age and height-to-age ratios for 151 children under her supervision suggests otherwise. Only a quarter are developing normally. The rest are showing signs of stunting that will permanently affect their health, mental development and workplace productivity.In the next village of Tamoliya, predominantly inhabited by "backward" castes among whom malnutrition levels are highest, the ICDS center had recently burned down in a blaze that consumed 36 homes. No one from ICDS had yet come to look around, and none of the villagers now living under makeshift polyethylene shelters believed the government intended to rebuild it. In Majhauli, the third village visited in Muzaffarpur, the ICDS center was padlocked. India's dismal progress in reducing malnutrition is an indictment of its ability to deliver basic public services. A lack of official accountability in a relatively small number of states is seen as the overarching problem. As with many of India's social problems, a small number of districts account for a large share of the burden. The four states of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan account for 43% of cases and have prevalence rates that are falling more slowly than in the rest of the country.The World Bank estimates that the physical toll of malnutrition alone costs the Indian economy 2% to 3% of gross domestic product a year. "If your large population mass in the north is physically and mentally stunted, how is this going to impact your growth in the long run?" asked Werner Schultink, a UNICEF child development and nutrition expert in India. "How will it affect India's ability to compete in the global market?" Yet at the current rate at which malnutrition levels are falling, India has no chance of meeting a United Nations Millennium Development Goal, which aims to halve the prevalence of underweight preschool children between 1990 and 2015. It is a source of embarrassment in a country that projects a high-tech face to international investors, boasts of its respect for human rights and aspires to be ranked among leading economic and political powers."Now that India is moving up the world order in terms of its economic development and desires to become a member of the United Nations Security Council, the state of many of the country's social indicators is encouraging a degree of introspection," Schultink said. "Malnutrition levels are falling by just 0.7 percentage points per year, which is far too slow. At current rates, India will be lucky to achieve the MDG goal in 2024, rather than 2015."The U.N. children's agency believes that the ICDS is failing because of a lack of community involvement. The agency has sought to improve the situation by tacking on a volunteer-based outreach program — called Dular, meaning love — which it believes could quicken the pace at which malnutrition levels fall in states such as Bihar. By 2009, UNICEF hopes, its Dular program will cover 8,000 ICDS centers across Bihar, at a cost of $1.3 million, most of which would be funded by the state government."By 2009 we can aim at a 20-to-25-percentage-point reduction in malnutrition by 2009," said Farhat Saiyed, UNICEF's project officer for child development and nutrition in Bihar. "That will be a challenge because the system has been dysfunctional for such a long time and we will need to do a lot of capacity building. But the government understands the importance of Dular and is becoming more receptive."Brought to power on the back of a wave of rural disillusion with the last government, the Congress-led coalition has made inclusive growth its raison d'etre. "We cannot allow a situation to persist in this country where food surpluses and accumulating food stocks coexist with starvation deaths and persistent malnutrition," Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said recently. "India can banish hunger and malnutrition. It is entirely doable."
Courtesy : latimes.com ( Los Angeles Times)
No comments:
Post a Comment