Scheme of Fortification of Food

With malnutrition increasingly becoming a menace among Indians, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare along with the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has come up with a scheme for fortification of food. For this purpose, the FSSAI has released new guidelines for the fortification of food, especially for packaged food, which shall contain essential micronutrients to combat the problem of malnutrition.

Questions & Answers

Differentiate between Food Fortification and Food Enrichment. Which of them is more beneficial to health and why?

Food enrichment means that the nutrients that were lost in the food processing are added back to it. One example of food enrichment is adding back few vitamins that were lost while making floor from wheat. Food fortification, on the other hand means that the nutrients were added in the food which were not present in the original food. One example of Food Fortification is the addition of Vitamin D to milk.

Thus, both differ in their means not ends. The objective of Fortification of food is to put in some micronutrients like vitamins and other basic elements in order to make it more nutritious; while food enrichment is to give the processed food its original nutrition value which was lost in food processing.

We note here that both of them are done either as a commercial choice or as a matter of public policy. Food fortification for example, is done especially in a situation where the staple food of the region lacks in the essential nutrients either due to the soil of the region or an inherent inadequacy of nutrients in the normal diet of the region. The Food and Agriculture Organization recognizes certain food products like milk and milk products, cereals and grains, infant food formula and oils for fortification.

“There is a need of proper and systematic approach to combat the problem of malnutrition in the country.” Critically examine in the light of state of malnutrition of India. To what extent, the scheme of Food Fortification may help to solve this problem?

Around 40% of the children in India suffer from malnutrition. The NFHS released Rapid Survey on Children shows that around 38.7% of children are stunted, 29.4% of the children are underweight and 15% of the children are wasted. While the Government has tried to provide several food subsidies, the rapidly increasing population in some parts of India has proved this method futile. The level of malnutrition also varies from state to state with Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand having the highest level of under nutrition while states like Mizoram, Sikkim, Manipur, Kerala, Punjab, and Goa have a comparatively lower level of malnutrition, although the level is not as low as that of many developed countries.

Malnutrition also increases the risk of deaths as it decreases the immunity leading to increase in frequency of the infections and delay in recovery. The stunted growth is also the cause of cognitive disability and reduced school and work performance among children.

At the international level; Global Hunger Index, 2015 has ranked India 20^th among the leading countries that suffer from serious hunger situations. Among the South Asian countries, it is only third after Afghanistan and Pakistan. The World Bank has also placed India in one of the highest rankings as having malnourished children and highest number of children with stunted growth. All these situations call for a proper and systematic approach to combat the problem of malnutrition.

Food fortification can be an effective tool to address the problem of malnutrition in India. It is a comparatively cheaper method to remove maximum malnutrition, especially among women. But it requires certain regulations to make it effective. The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has formulated certain fortification standards in October 2016 in this regard. The initiative began with that of wheat flour and then was slowly expanded. Wheat flour has been fortified as per international recommendations containing B12, iron and folic acid. Many states started providing these through their public distribution system and other programmes. The initiative was first taken by Darjeeling in 2000.

Food fortification has been adopted by FSSAI as a very good mechanism to address the problem of malnutrition, but it has remained very limited in implementation. Discuss while suggesting steps.

It is true that food fortification has remained limited to only few states and with only few food items such as wheat flour, rice, milk and oil. The initial step to be taken is making the distribution system transparent and accessible. If this problem of accessibility is removed, the purpose of fortifying food will be solved. Further, fortification of other foodstuffs is also essential to meet the goal of wholesome diet. In other words, a targeted programme for food fortification and distribution has to be commenced.

Further, some of the steps to be taken to make its enforcement proper include:

• Since the standards require every flour mill to add premixed nutrients the norms should be enforced in a manner such that its compliance is mandated by every section of producers.
• Improving the public distribution channel is a great means to make these fortified foods accessible to all poor sections of the society. For this purpose, the PDS has to be made efficient and free from corruption and red tapism.
• Along with providing fortified food, there must be provision for encouraging people to have a diversified and wholesome diet. This wholesome diet can be provided to children through mid-day meals so that maximum nutrition gains can be made.

The fortified food should be made compulsorily cheap so that it is affordable to all sections of the population, otherwise the whole purpose of it will be futile.