FG establishes nutrition department
Civil Society-Scaling Up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN) has commended the Federal Government for approving the establishment of Nutrition Department and creation of budget lines in Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs).
CS-SUNN Executive Secretary, Mr Sunday Okoronkwo, made the commendation in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja on Monday. He asked state and local governments to follow suit.
Okoronkwo told NAN on the sideline of a three-day training for journalists on nutrition reporting, organised by CS-SUNN, that the step, if implemented, would improve nutrition indices in the country. NAN recalls that Mr Clem Agba, Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, had on May 11 announced the approval of Nutrition Department in a letter to the Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire.
Agba explained that the Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning and the Technical Advisory Group of the National Council on Nutrition would work with the Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation to develop the operational structure. He added that they would also work on the Monitoring and Evaluation Framework to guide the process of the creation of the Nutrition Department in all line ministries, including the Federal Ministry of Health.
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Okoronkwo described the development as “a major lead” in the push for prominence of the nutrition sector and provide opportunity for improved funding to implement nutrition sensitive and specific interventions. “Having a nutrition department in all the line MDAs means that there will be a director that will be part of the management staff within the MDAs who will give nutrition a voice at the managerial level.
“This is one of the key things that was lacking in the past. This also means that each year, the department will have a dedicated budget line that will enable it to access the needed funds to implement a multi-sectoral plan of actions on nutrition.
“The multi-sectoral plan of action was an approach, designed to contribute to reducing malnutrition and achieving some of the targets in the national policy on food and nutrition,” he said.
Okonkwo called on the state and local governments across the country to follow suit, with a view to giving nutrition the attention it deserved. He disclosed that CS-SUNN is already working with the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning to replicate the development in its focal states of Kaduna, Kano, Niger, Nasarawa and Lagos. “It is expected that once the process is concluded at the federal level it will trickle down to all the states and local government areas,” he said.
According to him, this is the way to go and it will help nutrition intervention, contribute to changing the disturbing nutrition indices in line with the targets of nutrition policies and plans.
(NAN)
