Rama Kawade deficiencies (1 5). These deficiencies can have long-term consequences such as impaired behavioural and brain development, delayed sexual maturation, loss of final adult height and osteoporosis in adolescents (6 8). There- fore, studying micronutrient status during adolescence has become an important area of concern as their biological functions in prevention of disease have been identified. Amongst micronutrients, zinc is in the forefront due to the pervasive nature of zinc-dependent enzymes in metabolic processes; its vital role in several body functions such as vision, taste perception, cognition, cell reproduc- tion, growth, immunity; and beneficial effect of zinc supplementation in many disease states. Zinc deficiency is a health problem in many communities, especially among adolescents because of their pubertal growth spurt. Nearly half of the world’s population is at risk due to inadequate zinc intake, suggesting that public health programmes are urgently needed to reduce zinc deficiency (9). To understand the nature and magnitude of the nutri- tional deficiencies, it is essential to investigate the dietary intakes and lifestyle factors of adolescents and examine their health risks. Changes in lifestyle may affect eating habits and food choices of adolescents. Eating healthy foods is an important part of a healthy lifestyle, and healthy nutritional practices need to be inculcated during child- hood and early adolescence. However, international re- search has reported unwholesome food habits in adolescents, such as consumption of soft drinks, fried foods and non-inclusion of fruits and vegetables in the diet (10, 11), leading to nutritional inadequacy, and particu- larly micronutrient deficiencies, in adolescents (2, 3, 12). In Indian adolescents, inadequate intake of several micronutrients such as iron, vitamin A and C are widespread (13, 14, 15) because staple diets are predo- minantly cereal based, and intakes of meat, fish, dairy products, fruits and vegetables are low (4, 5, 16, 17). Further, cereal-based diets contain high amounts of phytate, which reduce the bioavailability of minerals (18), implying a higher risk of iron and zinc deficiencies in Indian adolescents. In our earlier study on married adolescent girls (15 19 years), it was observed that mean intakes of micronutrients including zinc were 40 75% less than the recommended dietary intakes (RDI) for Indian adolescent girls (19). However, there is no systematically collected information on prevalence of zinc deficiency across the country in India (20). Nevertheless, the predictions based on dietary patterns indicate that mild or moderate zinc deficiency could be widespread in Indian adolescents (21). Moreover, among Indian ado- lescents, girls are at more risk due to low social status (22), disparities in household work patterns, lack of education, early marriage, which determine the quality of diet for adolescent girls. 2 (page number not for citation purpose) To ensure micronutrient quality of diets, dietary guide- lines emphasise a need for including whole grains and a variety of vegetables and fruits in diets (23, 24). However, to evaluate diets for their nutritional adequacy there is a need to translate these guidelines into a simple measuring tool. Diet quality index or scores are tools used as a measure of diet quality, which assess compliance with prevailing dietary guidelines. For assessing nutrient adequacy of diet, various factors are considered, such as food variety, ratio of actual nutrient intake to recommended intake and so on (25 27). Some studies have reported measures of fruit and vegetable intakes in adolescents, which will be indirectly helpful in assessing the micronutrient quality of their diets (28, 29). However, none of these available indices gave due attention to food practices and consumption of type of foods, which promote bioavailability of micronu- trients; also, neither of these focus on micronutrient consumption per se. Food habits such as consumption of tea with meal adversely affects mineral bioavailability due to presence of tannins (18, 30), whereas food processes such as sprouting and fermentation are known to degrade phytates, thereby enhancing the bioavailability of minerals (31, 32). Therefore, such practices must be considered while formulating the micronutrient quality index for vegetar- ians. In view of the increasing prevalence of vegetarianism (33), which is particularly high in India, it is imperative to create an index for evaluating micronutrient deficiency risk for vegetarians in general and for adolescent girls in particular. To overcome the public health problem of nutritional deficiencies, food-based approaches such as dietary diver- sification in the form of locally available and culturally accepted foods at household level have been suggested (2, 34, 35). Enhancement of micronutrient density of habitual diets may be a more sustainable, economical, feasible and culturally acceptable method and can be used to alleviate several micronutrient deficiencies simultaneously without risk of antagonistic interactions (36). Most of the studies using supplementation strategies to alleviate nutrient deficiencies, mainly iron and zinc, have opted for enrich- ing beverages, salts, or foods with multiple micronutrient combinations (17, 37, 38). Studies reporting dietary supplementation of zinc are few and have used animal foods to enhance zinc absorption (37, 39). Dietary intervention in rural Kenyan schoolchildren in the form of school snacks has been found to be beneficial in reducing micronutrient deficiencies, especially those of iron and zinc (37). Considering dietary habits of vegetar- ian adolescents, there is a need to develop sustainable dietary intervention using zinc-rich vegetarian food sources and adopting suitable cooking methods to improve the bio-available zinc intake of adolescents. The effect of zinc supplementation can be measured using functional indices of zinc as an impact indicator (40, Citation: Glob Health Action 2012, 5: 7353 - DOI: 10.3402/gha.v5i0.7353