An assessment of the causes of malnutrition in Ethiopia: A ...

coordinates the different implementing ministries and public agencies, as well as private,
NGO, and donor sector participants.
3.7.1.2. Advocacy and awareness creation
In the past, absence of a strong advocacy and awareness creation movement seems to
contribute to the weak link between food and nutrition policy and strategy formulation and
implementation in Ethiopia. Advocacy campaigns by concerned government, NGOs, and
bilateral and multi-lateral UN and other agencies should be encouraged and the needed
support provided. Advocacy work around policymaking organs, as well as awareness creation
among the different technicians and practitioners in agriculture, health, food processing
industries, and social-infrastructure and service provision ministries and agencies as well as
private sector and NGOs should be embarked upon.
The immediate focus in terms of advocacy and awareness creation should revolve
around the following two issues. First, advocacy efforts need to address the grave
malnourishment problem affecting infants, young children, and women, since these
individuals hold the future sources of prosperity for the nation. Secondly, advocacy should
seek to eliminate the food-bias and convince agricultural professionals that addressing the
food utilization aspect of the FSS is not sufficient to achieve a national and regional goal of
nutrition security and building a healthy and active society.
3.7.1.3. The need for NNS to integrate food, caring and health activities
Ethiopia is the second most severely affected by malnutrition worldwide (Kaluski et
al. 2002). Its National Nutrition Strategy therefore needs to encompass cross-cutting issues
involving key stakeholders working in many different sectors and development programs. The
strategy should be based on identified nutrition priorities and take effective actions towards
these, to not only protect and enhance the nutritional wellbeing of Ethiopia’s population, but
also to achieve each individual’s potential of healthy and productive life.
NNS has to incorporate improved food security at national, regional, community and
household levels among its priority areas of action. The nutrition strategy shall have a strong
component of food-based interventions among its caring and health components. According
to Ruel and Levin, among others, food-based interventions aim to (a) increase the production
and availability of and access to foods rich in vitamin A and iron through the promotion of
home production; (b) increase the intake of foods rich in vitamin A and iron through nutrition
education, communication, social marketing, and behavior change programs to improve
dietary quality among vulnerable groups, and (c) increase the bioavailability of vitamin A and
iron in the diet either through home preservation or processing techniques (Ruel and Levin
2000).
3.7.1.4. The need for conditional policy
The Ethiopian nutrition strategy should not only overcome the food bias of past
policy, but also overcome the conceptual problem of fixing the determinants of nutritional
status to rural-agricultural households. The urban-rural as well as the production-supply and
access to food and non-food components of the nutrition security determinants should be well
contained in the strategy.
In this regard, the Ethiopian government should adopt a conditional policy
formulation process to introduce dynamism to food insecurity and malnutrition assessment,
analysis and prompt intervention. This can be done by empowering and enabling local
governments both in terms of allocation of financial and human resources and in allowing
them to work together with the private sector, NGOs and donors. The policy process should
allow for flexibility in implementing development programs focusing on education,
industrialization, water supply, sanitation, transportation, and communication, particularly
when the integrated food and nutrition components built into the programs are important.
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