The Goan EveryDay: Distribution is not the same as nutrition

In the Global Hunger Index report released on Saturday, India fell six places to rank 107th out of 121 countries. This means that India is now on par with several countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. – A country where India is helping supply food grains in the wake of an ongoing famine.

The response to the government has been typical and now the norm, accusing rating or indexing agencies of trying to smear India in dubious ways, while at the same time India is one of the largest food producers. and the world’s distribution system and food are often distributed free of charge to even the poorest people.

Governments may be right to claim that they distribute the most food in the world and have robust systems to ensure that food is distributed across the country, but the point of the Hunger Index is I miss it completely.

Hunger Index measures results. That is, it explores nutritional parameters across populations across the country. In particular, we check parameters such as child nutrition and child stunting and child wasting due to malnutrition. The general population before reaching the final index. India clearly scores very poorly on these parameters and should be cause for concern, even if it is not immediately visible.

But governments are learning all the wrong lessons from the exponent. Rather than investigating programmatic deficiencies, the quality of the grains distributed, their nutritional value, whether the undernourished people belong to oppressed castes or sections of society, or any other distributions that may occur. Check for shortages.

It is well known that the majority of commodities, rice and wheat, are distributed under the public distribution system, Prime Minister Ghalib Kalyan Anna Yojana scheme and other schemes of central and state governments. . However, neither of the two grains are particularly nutritious and will in no way help meet the human body’s daily balanced dietary requirements. While helpful, these two meals aren’t very nutritious, especially if they’re just being eaten by the family that receives them.

Indeed, the government also distributes legumes like dal and beans, but they are limited in quantity and not enough for families, especially going hungry. The ideology of vegetarianism requires a lot of lobbying and pushback from those within the government that control the narrative, even ensuring that boiled eggs are distributed to children as part of their lunch. It means

In this context, the bizarre rebuttal to the World Hunger Index report leads us to believe that the government sees this as an image problem rather than an actual problem that needs to be addressed. It’s this attitude that got us here in the first place, and the sooner we can avoid it.