Food security must focus on children' - The Hindu

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Food security must focus on children'
Staff Reporter
Convention suggests steps to combat malnutrition

The second national convention on children's right to food concluded here on Sunday with a call to link anti-malnutrition strategies to inflationary indices. The three-day convention in which about 1,000 delegates from 21 States participated, adopted a 25-point charter on combating malnutrition. ,Shanta Sinha, chairperson of the National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR), stressed on focussing on the disadvantaged sections in the fight against malnutrition. Blaming the Central and State governments for rampant malnutrition across the country, Dr. Sinha called for a decentralised approach to counter malnutrition. There should be better coordination between the two and the ultimate responsibility to answer for child deaths should be fixed with either on eof them, Vibhanshu Joshi, chairperson of the Madhya Pradesh commission for the protection of child rights said. Right to food activists Biraj Patnaik and Sachin Jain and National Campaign for People's Right to Information (NCPRI) activist Nikhil De participated along with MLAs from Madhya Pradesh and officials from the State's women and child development department. Eighty-nine percent of the population of Madhya Pradesh fails to get adequate nutrition while 55 lakh children are forced to lead malnourished lives. Any strategy to combat malnutrition, therefore, needs to put food security at the core with special focus on the needs of children. The ICDS and other health schemes alone simply cant do the job, said Sachin Jain, State adviser to the Supreme Court-appointed Right to Food Commissioners. The 25-point charter calls for universalisation and diversification of the Public Distribution System under the proposed national Right to Food Act, universalisation of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) scheme, ensuring job security and social security for Anganwadi workers among others.

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10-10-2013 19:35