‘Nutrition key to meeting Nigeria’s human capital development targets’

Experts have said Nigeria will not meet its human capital development target if nutrition is not prioritised.

Quoting World Bank statistics, they said Nigeria’s ranking of 152 out of 157 on the human capital index points to the fact that the country is yet to prioritise nutrition to contribute to national economic growth and development.

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They said it also shows that effort towards the achievement of human capital development is slow.

The experts stated this during a media roundtable on resetting nutrition for human capital development, organised by the Civil Society-Scaling Up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN).

CS-SUNN Executive Secretary, Sunday Okoronkwo, said advancing human capital development in the country requires investment from the very beginning of life through the provision of adequate nutrition and care for mother and child from childbirth.

He called on government to fund the 1% Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) of the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF) to improve funding of nutrition-sensitive and specific interventions.

Represented by Lilian Okafor,, the Communications Officer- CS-SUNN , he said budgetary allocations for nutrition  are still low with abysmal releases.

While saying current investments in proven nutritional interventions are still inadequate compared to the magnitude of the problem, Okoronkwo called for innovative ways of financing nutrition programming at all levels including increase in domestic funding.

He added that new strategies to increase budgetary allocation and raise additional funds are critical to meeting Nigeria’s human capital development ambition.

The CS-SUNN boss said Nigeria’s nutrition data management systems are weak at both the national and sub-national levels. He said it is critical to establish an Integrated Food and Nutrition Information Systems as stipulated in the National Policy of Food and Nutrition to enhance availability and use of routine nutrition data to better support policy development, programme designs and monitoring.

Mary Makanjuola, CS-SUNN Project Officer, said the organisation is implementing the Partnership for Improving Nigeria Nutrition Systems 2.0 (PINNS-2.0) project.

“PINNS-2.0 investment outcomes address four key priorities: governance, nutrition data management, funding, and building stronger CSAs to hold the government accountable,” she said.