With an aim to target the problem of malnutrition, stunting and low birth weight babies in the country, the Union Cabinet has approved the National Nutrition Mission (NNM) with a three-year budget of Rs 9,046.17 crore commencing from 2017-18.
As an apex body, the NNM will aim to monitor, supervise, fix targets, and guide the nutrition-related interventions across Ministries, announced Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Friday. The Cabinet approved the Mission on Thursday.
Though there are several schemes directly/indirectly affecting the nutritional status of children (0-6 years age), pregnant women and lactating mothers, the level of malnutrition and related problems in the country has remained high.
The NNM has a target to reduce under-nutrition and low birth weight by 2 per cent each year. It will strive to achieve reduction in stunting from 38.4 per cent as per the National Family Health Survey-4 to 25 per cent by 2022.
Addressing the media, Union Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi said "The Government is committed to ensure that every child and pregnant woman and lactating mother gets adequate nutrition to eliminate malnutrition and stunting.
"The mission will strive to reduce the level of stunting, under nutrition, anemia and low birth weight babies. The results of setting up of the National Nutrition Mission will show up within a year," she added.
Our three-pronged plan to curb malnutrition is to provide nutritious food, check quality of delivery and monitor the system, Gandhi said.
It aims to bring down anaemia among young children, women and adolescent girls by three per cent per year. More than 10 crore people will benefit from the programme, according to an official statement.
All the districts will be covered under the mission in a phased manner -- 315 districts in 2017-18, 235 districts in 2018-19 and remaining districts in 2019-20.
At the heart of the mission is the use of information communication technology to monitor the implementation of the scheme as well as to check pilferage in distribution of supplementary nutrition at anganwadis under the Integrated Child Development Scheme, according to the statement.
Union Health Minister JP Nadda said that the mission is the biggest step to ensure nutrition to each child and mother. An elaborate mechanism will be put in place under the Mission to monitor and track nutrition status, he said.
Aadhaar card is a mandatory requirement to avail the benefits of the mission, Women and Child Development Secretary R K Shrivastava said adding that implementation strategy would be based on intense monitoring and Convergence Action Plan right upto the grass root level.