Dear All,
At the outset, we wish you, your families and your colleagues a very happy, healthy and successful 2022.
We are happy to bring you the October - December -2021 quarter
issue of the WIN Newsletter. The quarter saw nearly full scale
project activities by our partners, though, as of now, the rapid rise
in the cases driven by the omicron variant is a cause of
concern.
In the nutrition project at Sanand, we see a very promising beginning
by aspiring women microentrepreneurs, as they began their product
journey by producing snacks for Diwali, while nearly 40 field health
workers underwent a rigorous 3 days training on the mother and child
nutrition based on the “1st 1000 days” concept. Our partners Samerth,
SMDT and Nikesh continue to play a stellar role in these initiatives.
In WatSan, our focus on agri-water data system, with the objective to
provide advisory to marginal farmers, continues to deepen with more
villages and farms being brought under the system, in Kutch and Dwarka
districts by our partners Arid Communities and Technologies. We are now
starting to extend the same to selected villages in Sabarkantha through
Viksat.
We are also actively engaging with NGOs and other skilling service providers to utilize our skillingtowin.org online platform, which we offer at no cost to them.
We continue our Science in Action Series in this issue, with 2
nutrition practitioner-scientists with deep expertise, sharing
their views on nutrition challenges and approaches. We welcome more
articles for our future issues.
The National Bio-Entrepreneurship Competition (NBEC) 2021 had its
finale in Dec’21. This saw several outstanding winners, including the
two who received WIN awards: (i) Humus Biosystems for WatSan and
(ii) Haemac Healthcare for MCH. This issue covers them in brief.
With Warm Regards,
Paresh Vora
Director India Operations
Latest Updates
We
continue to address the critical challenges in the area of Maternal and
child nutrition and launched our third project based on our
multistakeholder approach with our NGO implementing partner Saath
Livelihoods in slum areas of Ahmedabad covering appx. 30000
population, with additional support from SMDT for nutrition training.
The Nutrition project with Samerth Charitable launched in
September 2021, is off to a promising start in mobilising, training and
developing women entrepreneurs in the area of Sanand covering 5
villages. On the occasion of Diwali, as a part of training
session, the project team had organised two days trial product
developing sessions to prepare Diwali snacks, utilising the WIN
supported mobile kitchen facility. The enthusiastic potential women
entrepreneurs actively participated and made 11 snacks. The
products were also sent to Nutrition Group CTARA, IIT Bombay
for nutrition analysis.
Under the same project, with the support of Samerth Charitable Trust,
Dr. Rupal Dalal and her team from SMDT conducted a 3 days of
training `Training of Trainers (ToT)’ for 40 selected women (Asha
workers, Public Health workers, some SHGs) to provide training on
- nutrition for 1st 1000 days starting from conception, including
mother’s nutrition, new born nutrition by mother’s feeding and
subsequently additional food – up to about 2 years of age. The trainees
will carry on their role as trainers and counsellors, particularly for
mothers, and in general for the community, to bring greater awareness
and adoption of practices for better nutrition and hygiene.
Looking at the high impact of this training for health workers, we plan
two more training programs in (1) Vasna, Ahmedabad and (2)
Khambhaliya, Dwarka district, in Feb-March'22.
The grand finale of National Bio Entrepreneurship Competition
(NBEC) 2021, organized by C-CAMP on behalf of Department of
Biotechnology was held on 18th Dec’21 and WIN Foundation award winners
were (i) Vasanth Ramesh, Humus Biosystems for WatSan and (ii)
Prasad Muddam & Akitha Kolloju, Haemac Healthcare for MCH.
WIN Foundation has joined, as co-organizer with Maker Bhavan
Foundation, in their Vishwakarma Award for Engineering Innovation 2022
contest. This year’s annual thematic focus is “Water &
Sanitation''. Details are covered in this issue.
We continue to support innovative startups under
our WIN Innovative Product Market Validation Program for
innovative technologies. Under this we are introducing (I) weather
station and soil moisture metres by Soilsens and (ii) Soil and Water
testing kits by FFEM, in the tribal area of Sabarkantha district,
Gujarat through our NGO partner Viksat. (https://www.winfoundations.org/programs/)
Science in Action Series - 2
In
this issue, we have articles from two accomplished research
scientists in nutrition domain. Based on their on ground experience as
well as research, they provide their practical insights and suggestions
on challenges in tackling malnutrition in India.
WIN Foundation has initiated a "market creation at community level"
approach for tackling malnutrition, using dual strategy of (i) Push
(supply) by creating women microentrepreneurs to make and market
nutritious products for community and (ii) Pull (demand) creation
through training of field health workers on mother and child nutrition,
who in turn will train and counsel mothers on good nutrition and
hygiene practices.
ADDRESSING HEALTH AND NUTRITION - THE PERSONALIZED APPROACH TO WELLNESS
Dr.Jamuna Prakash, Adjunct Professor, MLC University, Shillong.
Former Professor, Food Science and Nutrition, Univ. of Mysore, Mysuru.
Good
health is the ultimate goal of every human being and good food is one
of the gateways to achieve it. Here ‘good food’ refers to nutritionally
balanced, safe and healthy meal and does not mean the taste quality of
food per se. Despite being an agriculture dominant nation, India
suffers with varying degrees of malnutrition, seen both in adults and
children alike. While there are multiple avenues to deal with the
issue, the WIN foundation is very rightly addressing it through their
maternal and child health program of developing women entrepreneurship
to promote healthy foods as well as promoting hygiene and sanitation in
the community. These two issues are undoubtedly most important in
addressing malnutrition in children and women.
The recent report of National Family Health Survey-5 points out both
negative and positive aspects of health-related indicators. There has
been a decline in neonatal, infant and child mortality rates, and the
literacy rates have
improved showing higher percentage of both men and women passing their
school education. There are more women empowerment programs and gender
equality schemes. However, on nutritional front, the scenario has been
rather depressing. Iron deficiency anemia is showing a larger and wider
spread, and the improvement in growth indicators of stunting, wasting
and underweight have been exceedingly low. This calls for a higher
investment and efforts for health and nutrition considering that
consequences have a far-reaching effect spreading across the adulthood
lowering productivity and work efficiency as well as a much higher risk
of non-communicable diseases in undernourished children.
Creating lifecycle approach to nutrition through personalized interactions
The experience in the field of nutrition has shown that one approach
towards improving nutrition of the masses is through personalized
interaction and counselling [apart from various ongoing programs]. This
can be done using the already existing resources of health workers and
the wellness centers, which will be operable in near future. The team
of health workers comprising of doctors, nutritionists, and other
paramedics on personalized one-to-one basis paving way for individual
attention. These counselling sessions can be on monthly basis and can
deal with health status and nutritional problems of children, women,
men and elderly from a family. This would create a genuine lifecycle
approach and will have a strong psychological impact on the family of
caring. This would encourage them to follow the advice regarding
healthy diets, desirable food preparation, special needs of children,
elderly or any other diseased person in the family and hygiene as
well.
While malnutrition in children is just one of the problems to tackle
with, there are also numerous instances of lifestyle disorders across
the community, which needs to be prevented or managed well. These
counselling sessions would deal with all the health issues of family by
way of advising them on all aspects of healthcare including
self-management advice.
The process would require the following- A family health record to be
maintained with the necessary details of all family members, for
example the age, height and weight, blood pressure, general health, and
medical condition along with the treatment history. A diet pattern can
also be maintained based on which counselling can be done. The progress
and adherence of the family regarding desirable food behavior and
proper management of diseases can be monitored very well with this, and
slight deviations will be observed early. This would also bring forth
the group of elderly, who are often neglected by families, and they
also can be provided with necessary comfort care.
The multi-sectoral approach towards health
A point to be noted here is that health is an outcome of multiple
factors and not diet alone. The counselling session will bring forth
the non-nutritional issues which could be important for health such as
availability of adequate potable water for drinking or for hygiene
purposes, the pollution around the houses, the social issues of
drinking, poverty, food taboos, superstitions, unemployment, school
dropouts, etc. While the support center may not be able to solve all of
them, it will create an understanding of the prevailing situation. The
problem needs to be tackled with multiple angles and approaches.
For example, one of the reasons for children not responding to various
nutrition supplements in attaining normal growth status is frequent
episodes of gastrointestinal and respiratory infections.
Scientific evidence shows that repeated gastrointestinal infections
shorten the intestinal villi thus reducing the absorption capacity,
resulting in malabsorption syndrome which could be long lasting.
A morbidity record maintained at the center would be helpful in knowing
if a particular child falls sick frequently. Now, the next step apart
from administering proper treatment to child will be of exploring the
causes, is it because of low immunity, polluted water, unhygienic
environs, or a repeated exposure to infections? An analysis would help
to deal with the causes which may not be related to nutrition directly.
Once these repeated episodes of infections are arrested, a child can
attain the normal growth. Similarly, questions need to be asked, if the
mother or caretaker is adequately informed or educated, a personalized
approach would certainly help these issues.
Unhealthy foods and emerging issue of overweight and obesity
Let us now look at one more aspect of emerging health issue in women
and children, that of overweight and obesity, obviously both linked to
transitioning food behavior. A general perception of obesity is that it
occurs in affluent society or urban areas. However, the trend is
changing and so called unhealthy food is eaten across all regions,
whether urban or rural. Many of our own surveys in rural areas show
that ‘fast foods’ specifically sold by street vendors has gained
popularity even in rural India. Undoubtedly, these are energy rich, fat
rich sugary or fried foods with
a very low content of fiber and essential vitamins and minerals
[prepared mostly with refined wheat flour, hydrogenated fats, cheap
oils, sugar and salt]. By far, sugar, refined flours and oils are the
cheapest sources of calories and foods providing protective nutrients
are expensive, [these include whole grams and dhals, milk and milk
products, eggs, fish and animal foods, fruits and vegetables, nuts,
etc.], hence it is easy to binge on foods which are cheap and satiate
hunger, with no consideration for overall healthy nutrient density.
This is indeed a very serious and complex issue to tackle as food laws
cannot prohibit people from eating unhealthy foods!!! Though only
advisories can be issued. Intake of such foods also increases the salt
intake. While human beings are genetically programmed to like sweet
taste, the taste of salt is adaptive, the more we eat, the more we
like. And the taste threshold goes on increasing. This is very
well exploited by food industry where a higher amount of added salt
lures customer. Therefore, a deliberate attempt to lower salt is needed
from all angles, though easier said than done. There has been a
tremendous increase in online home delivery of catered foods across the
country during pandemic, which has its own plus and minus points,
increasing the convenience, creating employment, improving business,
but also encouraging intake of unhealthy foods. The pandemic also
affected the many welfare programs and school attendance of children
increasing the rates of malnutrition, as children were deprived of
regular mid-day meal on account of school closures. For some of the
children mid-day school meal is the only substantial meal of the day
and source of important nutrients.
So, the simple take home point towards improving malnutrition is an
overall continuous effort from all the stakeholders involved to secure
the future of our children. Malnutrition is a silent emergency, the
voice of which is very loud, but cannot be heard, and we need to act
before it is too late.
COMBATING MALNUTRITION THROUGH NUTRIENT DELIVERY TECHNIQUES Prof. Amit Arora, Associate Professor, CTARA, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay Ms.Nisha Pujari, Research Scholar, CTARA, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay
“The
doctors of the future will no longer treat the human frame with drugs,
but rather will cure and prevent disease with nutrition.” – Thomas
Edison
Good
nutrition is an essential driver of sustainable development because it
plays a critical role in brain development, generates broad-based
economic growth, and signals the fulfilment of people’s rights to food
and good health. Malnutrition refers to deficiencies, excesses,
or imbalances in a person’s intake of energy and/or nutrients (WHO,
2019).
Micronutrients are essential elements required in small quantities
throughout our life to orchestrate a range of physical and mental
functions to maintain health. The consequences of their absence are
severe and lead to micronutrient malnourishment (CDC, 2019). According
to the national data for India (NFHS-5), the condition of wasting and
micronutrient malnutrition has worsened in the last few years. The most
widespread and recognized micronutrient deficiencies are of iron, zinc,
vitamin A, iodine, vitamin D, and folate, often occurring concurrently
in the sample population (Suchdev, 2017). As per NFHS 5, the percentage
of total children aged 6-23 months receiving an adequate diet is very
low (~11.3%). Anaemic children aged between 6 and 59 months have also
gone up significantly from 58.6% to 67.1%. Likewise, 59 out of 100
women aged 15-19 years are anaemic.
Many strategies have been suggested to combat micronutrient
deficiencies, such as exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6
months, controlling parasitic infections, food fortification, food
diversification and nutritional supplementation. Food fortification is
considered as a relevant and potent intervention by the authorities to
reduce the burden of micronutrient deficiencies among
children and mothers. It involves adding micronutrients to processed
foods, which increases their concentration and thus
fulfilling dietary requirements.
The selection of nutrients is based on evidence of low intakes in a
population and/or widespread nutrient deficiencies which vary between
countries and populations. Fortification programs, therefore, need to
be carefully designed to meet the nutrient needs of a given population.
Food processing has enormous potential to both increase
dietary-diversity and enhance concentrations of micronutrients in
commonly consumed foods. Technologists and scientists are
making efforts in employing food‐to‐food fortification, by
adding micronutrient‐dense foods to food recipes at household as
well as commercial level to increase their micronutrient quality.
Food-based strategies to combat micronutrient malnutrition
Evidence-based
interventions for malnutrition have been well studied and can be
categorized as nutrition-specific (address immediate causes, often at
the individual level) or nutrition-sensitive (address underlying
causes, often at the community level). Policy and programme makers
incorporate food-based strategies such as dietary diversification, food
fortification and supplementation, along with other additional measures
on food safety, nutrition education and public health. These approaches
should be regarded as complementary, with their relative importance
depending on local conditions and local needs. Food-based strategies
are discussed as follows:
(i) Dietary Diversity
Increasing dietary diversity is a preferred way of improving nutrition
of a population because it has the potential to improve the
simultaneous intake of many food constituents including micronutrients.
Diverse diets have been reported to provide for vitamins and minerals
that prevent ‘hidden hunger’ and micronutrient deficiency diseases
(Dulal et al., 2017; Jones et al., 2014; Nithya & Bhavani, 2018;
Rosenberg et al., 2018). Increasing dietary diversity means increasing
consumption quantity and range of micronutrient-rich foods. In
practice, this requires implementation-programmes to improve
availability and consumption of different micronutrient-rich foods
(such as animal products, fruits and vegetables) in adequate
quantities, especially among those who are at risk or vulnerable to
micronutrient malnutrition (Nithya & Bhavani, 2018). However,
increasing dietary diversity on a sustained basis has its challenges.
One being introduction of behavioural change through counselling about
different foods and their nutritional benefits. Lack of resources for
producing and purchasing higher quality foods can sometimes present a
barrier to achieving greater dietary diversity, especially in the case
of poorer populations (L. Allen et al., 2006).
(ii) Supplementation
Supplementation is the term used to describe the provision of
relatively large doses of micronutrients, usually in the form of pills,
capsules or syrups. Micronutrient supplements during pregnancy can act
as a precautionary measure for reducing morbidity and mortality in
infants and also in treating maternal complications during pregnancy
(Lawn et al., 2014). In our country, supplementation programmes are run
to provide iron and folic acid to pregnant women, and vitamin A to
infants, children under 5 years of age and postpartum women. Recently,
the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) has launched the
Weekly Iron and Folic Acid Supplementation Programme to meet the
challenge of high prevalence and incidence of anaemia amongst
adolescent girls and boys.
Supplementation usually requires procurement of micronutrients in a
relatively expensive pre-packaged form, an effective distribution
system and a high degree of consumer compliance (L. Allen et al.,
2006). Some adverse effects observed with high-dose supplements and
logistical and human-resource constraints, may result into
non-compliance and the long-term sustainability of such programmes. In
such cases, mass fortification of staple foods becomes an important
option to combat vitamin and mineral deficiencies. There are fewer
concerns related to mass food fortification and it can be a
complementary intervention to supplementation for efforts to decrease
vitamin and mineral deficiencies (Peņa-Rosas et al., 2019).
(iii) Food fortification
Food fortification involves adding micronutrients to processed foods.
It describes improvement of essential micronutrient content in foods to
enhance the nutritional and health benefits with minimal risk to
health. In many situations, this strategy can lead to relatively rapid
improvements in the micronutrient status of a population, and at a
reasonable cost, especially if advantage can be taken of existing
technology and local distribution networks (L. Allen et al.,
2006). There have been studies with single (Dean et al., 2020),
dual (Jannasch et al., 2020), and multiple micronutrient fortification,
including zinc, iron, copper, selenium, vitamin A, vitamin B complexes,
vitamin C and vitamin E (Das et al., 2019). Minerals are fortified in
their salt forms such as ferrous sulphate, ferrous gluconate, ferrous
lactate, zinc oxide, zinc sulphate, zinc acetate, zinc chloride,
calcium carbonate, calcium phosphate, tri-calcium citrate, calcium
lactate, calcium lactate gluconate, calcium gluconate, etc.
(Gharibzahedi & Jafari, 2017). Considering the regional diversity
in terms of food availability, fortification should be done in a
customized manner to ensure compliance. In addition fortificants should
be low in cost with good absorption, and well accepted by the target
population in terms of taste and organoleptic properties. In most
cases, it is preferable to use food vehicles that are centrally
processed, and to have the support of the food industry (Chadare et
al., 2019). However, of these three methods (dietary diversity,
food fortification and supplementation), programmes that deliver
micronutrient supplements often see a quick improvement in the
micronutrient status of the targeted population. Food fortification
tends to have a less immediate but nevertheless a much wider and more
sustained impact. Although increasing dietary diversity is generally
regarded as the most desirable and sustainable option, it takes the
longest to implement (L. Allen et al., 2006; Gharibzahedi & Jafari,
2017).
Food-to-Food fortification
Food-to-food fortification is a technique of fortifying food products
with one or more food ingredient(s), thus making a nutrient dense food.
Incorporation of nutritious ingredients calls for modification in
original food recipe, creating a new product with higher
nutritional benefits. Such fortification techniques
offer variety in taste and textures that are unique along with
enhanced protein, vitamin, fibre and/or mineral contents and beneficial
effects on its quality (Platel & Srinivasan, 2016). Cumin, moringa
and sesame fortified bread and soy-butter, moringa and cumin fortified
salty biscuits demonstrated improved total content and bio-accessible
minerals. Its inclusion in food products could be a useful alternative
or complement conventional fortification. This will
help to improve the mineral status of deficient
populations. Food‐to‐food fortification often uses locally available
foods to enhance their nutrient intake of the population. This approach
consists of selecting and associating foods in such a
way so as to optimize the bioavailability of useful
micronutrients to consumers.
IIT Bombay’s intervention
The Nutrition Groups at IIT Bombay emphasises on the development of food based nutrient-rich, safe, affordable and
ready-to-use formulation. Achieving optimal nutrition through the
intake of healthy foods has a capability to optimise the physiological
functions of each human while ensuring maximum well‐being. The key
variable of this research is the presence of macro and micronutrients
in sufficient quantity without compromising on quality parameters. Our
research team at IIT Bombay is working on developing products with the
capability to deliver the full range of micronutrients mostly through
the natural product route, avoiding the chemical route. Our aim is also
to create local capacity among women’s SHGs or social start-ups for
decentralized production with appropriate Quality Control and Quality
Assurance protocols. Given the priority accorded to health and
nutrition projects in CSR funding, support to the food products lab can
go a long way in addressing the problem of hidden hunger among
malnourished children and women and benefit the programme
implementation in aspirational districts.
Some of the products which have been developed in CTARA are –
(i) Egg equivalent Idli and nutrition bar
A completely vegetarian formulation was developed in the form of nutritious
'Idlis' and bars that can act as nutrition replacement provided by
non-vegetarian foods such as eggs. The product's theoretical nutrient
profiling shows that 2 units of Idli or 1 standard nutri-bar is
sufficient to give equivalent nutrition to an Egg.
(ii) Magic add-on dry powder
This powder can be added to any given home-made recipes (e.g. Puree,
daliya, Khichdi, dal-rice etc.) and as a result, the child will get a
majority of the essential nutrients required for optimal growth and
development. The major advantage here is gaining nutrient adequacy
without changing the dietary habits or preferences. Financial
calculations for the developed formulation (DF) suggest that
affordability is achievable at mass product scale to achieve reasonable
dissemination and ultimately greater impact on the
children.
Other examples include Healthy alternatives to commercially available Ready to Use Therapeutic Foods (RUTF).
Challenges of food fortification
Theoretically the fortification techniques aim at efficient lowering of
micronutrient malnutrition. These, however, still do not reflect
in the micronutrient status of individuals based on reports. The
following are some challenges faced during the choice and
implementation of food fortification strategies:
a) Cost
There is a lack of simple and affordable technology that can use stable
and bioavailable nutrients while maintaining the commonly preferred
taste and appearance of foods. Increased food prices remain an issue
affecting the food security and livelihoods of the needy. Despite
various international aids, basic foods are still not accessible
because they are unaffordable to vulnerable groups who often grow and
process their own staple foods. Major challenges to local‐scale
fortification programs include the initial cost of the mixing
equipment, the price of the premix, achieving and maintaining an
adequate standard of quality control, and sustaining monitoring and
distribution systems.
b) Concerns of absorption and bioavailability
Both the density and bioavailability of micronutrients in the diet are
important for achieving optimal micronutrient status. Iron, zinc, and
calcium can interact with each other to inhibit their respective
absorption. For e.g. The ideal iron fortificant is highly soluble in
water, similar to ferrous sulphate for the iron to be accessible
for intestinal absorption. At the same time, the iron needs to be in a
form that prevents it from interacting with dietary compounds that can
induce undesirable organoleptic changes and reduce iron bioavailability
by formation of insoluble complexes. Fat-soluble vitamins such as
vitamin A and E are poorly dispersible in water, making it difficult to
incorporate them in beverages and foods with high moisture
content.
Obtaining higher concentrations of micronutrients from food alone, to
meet high RDA for adolescent girls and pregnant women is challenging.
Processing techniques may lower anti nutrients but at the same time it
may increase risk of losses and degradation of minerals and vitamins,
respectively.
c) Toxicity
Toxicity may occur as a combined effect of more than one micronutrient.
Increased instances of anaemia have been found in individuals with high
levels of folate and low level of vitamin B12 (Rosenberg et al., 2018).
Acute iron toxicity is usually seen in children with accidental
ingestion of iron-containing syrups. Similarly, for zinc, folic acid,
selenium there are available documents with either report on toxicity
or regulation on the maximum limit (Food Safety and Standards Authority
of India, 2019). Usual intakes below the upper limit have a low risk of
adverse effects. Some nutrients do not have an upper limit because they
are assumed to be safe at any level of intake (e.g., vitamin B12).
The goal or any national food fortification policy is to prevent
nutritional deficiencies by bridging the gap between the requirement
and availability of the nutrients. In exceptional cases of widespread
and severe deficiencies, the fortification can be up to 100% of the
RDA. In practice, the level of fortification is about 15 to 30 % of RDA
(computed per 600 calories of the processed food) as per the
regulations in India (ICMR, 2018). When these precautions are followed,
food fortification carries a minimal risk of chronic toxicity.
d) Anti-nutritional factors
Poor dietary diversity and dependence on cereal-based diets are common
in low- and middle-income countries. Cereals, in addition to being poor
sources of vitamins and minerals, also contain high quantities of other
dietary compounds, such as phytates, which decrease the absorption of
certain micronutrients, often called 'anti-nutrients' (Graham 2001).
One of the most important concerns in the processing of mineral rich
foods is formation of strong complexes between bivalence elements
(e.g., Ca2+, Mg2+, Zn2+, Fe2+, Cu2+), and, phytate, oxalates, fiber,
and compounds of tannin and lectin (Shubham et al., 2020). For
instance, iron and zinc absorption is significantly inhibited by phytic
acid, present in cereals and other grains; polyphenols, contained in
red wine and chocolate; or calcium, abundant in dairy products
(Peņa-Rosas et al., 2019).
Crop diversity and Nutrition security
To be able to reach the overarching goal of nutrition security through
improved dietary diversity score of children and mothers, access to
high quality and diverse raw materials has to be ensured. Crop
diversity at affordable and scalable capacity would be central to
food-to-food fortification strategy. India being one of the largest
countries in the world has to ensure self-sufficiency in food. The
government’s initiatives to increase the production of rice, wheat,
pulses, and other crops have brought India to a very secure condition
in terms of calorie sufficiency as a whole. For example, rice alone
contributes to 40% of total grain production in India followed by wheat
(~34% contribution).
India is blessed with hundreds of highly nutritive indigenous crops
which are popular in many regions. However, in the past six
decades, India has witnessed a decrease in the area under such crops.
A classic example is production volume decline in variety of millets
over the last few decades. Since there is no minimum support price for
such crops, generation of demand for such crops based food products to
improve regional nutrition security would help farmer in realising
better prices. Of course, this would entail partnerships with local
grassroots organisations to build a sustained momentum to establish a
strong value chain. Safeguarding food and nutrition security
through promotion of diverse crop production systems should be looked
at by the policymakers more closely.
Conclusion
Micronutrient malnutrition is a major impediment to socio-economic
development. Vitamins and minerals have very different stability and
bioavailability in the food matrix. Therefore, the development of a
fortification technology that makes them bioavailable and more
compatible with the food vehicle would be crucial. To quantify
the size of the gap between usual intakes and requirements in a
population group, the distribution of usual intakes by individuals in
the population groups of concern (e.g., young children or women of
reproductive age, low socioeconomic status) should be compared to the
average requirement. A concerted effort is needed for the development
of ready-to-consume food products rich in multiple micronutrients,
addressing food accessibility and affordability issues, while enhancing
bioavailability and forming efficient food synergies.
“Those who think they have no time for healthy eating, will sooner or later have to find time for illness.” – Edward Stanley
NATIONAL BIO ENTREPRENEURSHIP COMPETITION (NBEC) – 2021
The
National Bio Entrepreneurship Competition (NBEC), organised by BREC - a
joint initiative of BIRAC and C-CAMP, with Department of Biotechnology
as the main sponsor, is a national platform to attract, identify, and
nurture bio-entrepreneurs with path breaking ideas for societal impact.
C-CAMP launched NBEC 2021 on 16th August’21. WIN Foundation was again a
category partner for NBEC 2021 for the domains of (1) Water and
Sanitation and (2) Maternal and child health.
NBEC 2021 received overwhelming response with over 2500+ applications
from 30 states and UTs of India. 300+ applications were shortlisted for
regional qualifier pitching round (virtual) in November. The Jury
members, from industry, academia, and investor community, shortlisted
72 business ideas for a virtual Boot Camp and Mentoring Program that
was held between 1-3 December.
At the NBEC 2021 Grand Finale on 18th December, 2021, 17 Startups and 5 student innovators were given awards.
WINNERS :
1. Vasanth Ramesh, Humus Biosystems – Decentralized wastewater
treatment system for public toilet complexes - won the WIN Foundation
cash prize of 3 lakhs INR and Sangam VC investment opportunity of
350,000 USD in Water & Sanitation category
2. Prasad Muddam & Akitha Kolloju, Heamac Healthcare – An
intelligent phototherapy device that can treat severe jaundice in
neonates - won the WIN Foundation cash prize of 3 lakhs INR in the
Maternal & Child Health category
WIN
Foundation joined Maker Bhavan Foundation as a co-organiser, in Maker
Bhavan's Vishwakarma Award for Engineering Innovation 2022, a national
contest. This year's theme for the contest is Water &
Sanitation
The
goal of Vishwakarma Prize is to create a hatchery for ambitious student
innovators and tinkerers, from any discipline, interested in developing
scalable technological solutions at the grassroots level that can
radically boost the nation’s economy.
Vishwakarma
Prize is an exciting opportunity for students in Indian science and
engineering colleges to form teams across engineering disciplines and
programs and develop a working physical prototype with a fully
demonstrated innovation. The teams will get mentoring from domain
experts including faculty at premier institutes, NGOs and
Industry.
The
Competition is open now. All shortlisted teams will have 4 months to
build a prototype. During this period, the teams will be provided with
funding and mentoring support and assessed to identify 10
finalists who will compete in finals for prizes, present to angel
investors, file patents – all crucial steps in supporting their
entrepreneurial journey into the real world. The teams will also be
eligible to be considered for WIN Foundation Innovative Product Market
validation scheme .
sed
interventions for malnutrition have been well studied and can be
categorized as nutrition-specific (address immediate causes, often at
the individual level) or nutrition-sensitive (address underlying
causes, often at the community level). Policy and programme makers
incorporate food-based strategies such as dietary diversification, food
fortification and supplementation, along with other additional measures
on food safety, nutrition education and public health. These approaches
should be regarded as complementary, with their relative importance
depending on local conditions and local needs. Food-based strategies
are discussed as follows:
d
ready-to-use formulation. Achieving optimal nutrition through the
intake of healthy foods has a capability to optimise the physiological
functions of each human while ensuring maximum well‐being. The key
variable of this research is the presence of macro and micronutrients
in sufficient quantity without compromising on quality parameters. Our
research team at IIT Bombay is working on developing products with the
capability to deliver the full range of micronutrients mostly through
the natural product route, avoiding the chemical route. Our aim is also
to create local capacity among women’s SHGs or social start-ups for
decentralized production with appropriate Quality Control and Quality
Assurance protocols. Given the priority accorded to health and
nutrition projects in CSR funding, support to the food products lab can
go a long way in addressing the problem of hidden hunger among
malnourished children and women and benefit the programme
implementation in aspirational districts.
utritious
'Idlis' and bars that can act as nutrition replacement provided by
non-vegetarian foods such as eggs. The product's theoretical nutrient
profiling shows that 2 units of Idli or 1 standard nutri-bar is
sufficient to give equivalent nutrition to an Egg. 
