By: Ireen Twongirwe
Worth Noting:
- We therefore need to ensure a legal and policy framework for improved nutrition, including Reviewing and integrating nutrition in the Agriculture Sector Development Strategy and Investment Plan (DSIP) and in the National Agriculture Policy. More so, developing guidelines for integrating nutrition in sector, district, and sub-county plans, policies, and agricultural activities.
- More to that, Providing strong political and technical leadership and commitment to nutrition within the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries and strong coordination with other ministries, including the Ministry of Health , the Ministry of Education and Sports , the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development , and the Ministry of Local Government.
It’s clear that Africa is still far from meeting the sustainable development goals to end poverty, achieve food security, improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. This is because Africa we have been faced with too much climate change impacts which has been too challenging for us to achieve.
According to a new report by humanitarian information source relief web, it shows that the number of hungry people in Africa continue to rise , spurred by conflicts, climate change and economic slowdowns. Further food insecurity is exacerbated by conditions such as poverty, inequalities and inappropriate policies.
Furthermore, the report recommends beefing up of humanitarian assistance across board, putting up of social protection measures to improve food security, nutrition and focused investment in agriculture, water, health, and education to reduce vulnerabilities.
More so, the report shows that after a long period of improvement between 2000and 2013, hunger worsened substantially between 2019 and 2020, driven by conflicts, climate extremes, economic slowdowns and the unaffordability of healthy diets.
It’s important to note that in 2020, the covid19 pandemic further underestimated efforts to reduce hunger and malnutrition in the region as national and global measures. The pandemic disrupted economic activities and livelihoods in service sectors such as tourism, agriculture, fishing, remittances among others.
Furthermore, food insecurity is a significant underlying cause of malnutrition
in Uganda and the causes of food insecurity in Uganda include poverty, landlessness, high fertility, natural disasters, high food prices, lack of education, and the fact that a majority of Ugandans depend on agriculture as a main source of income. Gender inequality only worsens food insecurity and poverty.
What can we do reduce on food insecurities?
We therefore need to ensure a legal and policy framework for improved nutrition, including Reviewing and integrating nutrition in the Agriculture Sector Development Strategy and Investment Plan (DSIP) and in the National Agriculture Policy. More so, developing guidelines for integrating nutrition in sector, district, and sub-county plans, policies, and agricultural activities.
More to that, Providing strong political and technical leadership and commitment to nutrition within the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries and strong coordination with other ministries, including the Ministry of Health , the Ministry of Education and Sports , the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development , and the Ministry of Local Government.
In addition, allocating more resources for implementing proven household-level agricultural interventions that can improve household food security and nutrition. we also need to strengthen the capacity of agricultural extension workers to implement household-level agricultural interventions, including integrating nutrition into pre- service and in-service training curricula for agricultural extension service providers. More so, we also need to put in place a monitoring and evaluation framework to track implementation of nutrition interventions for development.
Hence forth, women’s access to and control over productive resources, capital, and income generation can also reduce on food insecurity, we need to promote the use of labour-saving technologies to enable women to manage competing priorities and their caring, reproductive, and productive roles.
I therefore call upon government, civil society organization, private and public sectors to promote opportunities to train women in ago-processing at the household level, increase wages for male and female agricultural workers and ensure that men and women receive equal pay for equal work to increase families’ ability to buy nutritious foods.
There is also need to ensure safe working conditions for agricultural workers, including proper sanitation, provide opportunities for diversification of
household income and promote the adoption of high-yield nutritious crops, including bio fortified staples like iron- rich beans and orange sweet potatoes.
Increase on food productivity especially staples such as millet, sweet potatoes, sorghum, matoke, and maize which remain affordable for families and which are long lasting to reduce on soil erosion.
In conclusion, the above-mentioned interventions will help to improve on food production hence achieving the sustainable development goal 2 zero hunger and poverty.
For God and my country
Ireen Twongirwe
Executive Director, Women for Green Economy Movement Uganda.
John Kariuki