UK government's 'blind spot' on child hunger
The UK government's approach to tackling child hunger in poor countries "lacks focus and adequate resources", according to Save the Children.
Friday 18 January 2008
This follows a new report by the leading medical journal The Lancet that describes the broader international response to child malnutrition as 'dysfunctional'.
Malnutrition is an underlying factor in the deaths of one-third of the 10 million young children who die each year. Around one-third of all children in developing countries grow up stunted as a result of poor nutrition.
Yet our research shows that tackling child hunger accounts for just 6% of the overall budget of the UK government's Department for International Development (DFID). The department also lacks a coherent nutrition strategy.
David Mepham, Save the Children's Director of Policy, said the UK government appears to have a "blind spot" on child hunger and nutrition. He acknowledged DFID as a "global leader on health and education and many other aspects of development."
"Failure to make progress on child hunger and undernutrition puts in jeopardy the UK's efforts in education and health," David Mepham said. "Children who are malnourished suffer cognitive impairment, affecting their capacity to learn, and they have much weaker immune systems, making them more vulnerable to disease and early death." He added that the response from the UK, EU and other donors "does not match the scale of the problem."
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