Lok Sabha Question No. 2880 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2023-03-17
Subject: Global Hunger Index
Ministry: WOMEN AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT
Asked by: Abhishek Banerjee

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF WOMEN AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 2880

TO BE ANSWERED ON 17.03.2023

## GLOBAL HUNGER INDEX

## 2880.   SHRI ABHISHEK BANERJEE:

Will the Minister of Women and Child Development be pleased to state:

- a. whether India ranked 107 out of 121 countries in the world in Global Hunger Index;
- b. if so, the details thereof; and
- c. the corrective measures taken by the Government to improve the same?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF WOMEN AND CHILD DEVELOPMENT (SHRIMATI SMRITI ZUBIN IRANI)

(a)  to  (c)  As  per  Global  Hunger  Index  (GHI) 2022  released  by  Concern  Worldwide  and Welthungerhilfe, India stands at rank 107 out of 121 countries with a score of 29.1.

The GHI does not reflect India ' s true picture as it is a flawed measure of 'Hunger'. It should not be taken at face value as it is neither appropriate nor representative of hunger prevalent in a  country.  Out  of  its  four  indicators,  only  one  indicator,  i.e.,  undernourishment,  is  directly related  to  hunger.  The  two  indicators,  namely,  Stunting  and  Wasting  are  outcomes  of complex  interactions  of  various  other  factors  like  sanitation,  genetics,  environment  and utilisation of food intake apart from hunger which is taken as the causative/outcome factor for stunting and wasting in the GHI. Also, there is hardly any evidence that the fourth indicator, namely, child mortality is an outcome of hunger.

Data  on  nutritional  indicators  in  the  country  are  captured  periodically  under  the  National Family Health Survey (NFHS) conducted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. As per the recent NFHS-5 (2019-21) report, the nutrition indicators for children under 5 years have improved as compared with NFHS-4 (2015-16). Stunting has reduced from 38.4% to 35.5%, Wasting has reduced from 21.0% to 19.3% and Underweight prevalence has reduced from 35.8% to 32.1%.

Government has accorded high priority  to  the  issue  of  malnutrition  and  is  making  serious efforts to address this issue. The efforts under the Supplementary Nutrition Programme under Anganwadi  Services  and  POSHAN  Abhiyaan  have  been  rejuvenated  and  converged  as ' Saksham  Anganwadi  and  POSHAN  2.0 ' (Mission  Poshan  2.0).  It  seeks  to  address  the challenges  of  malnutrition  in  children,  adolescent  girls,  pregnant  women  and  lactating mothers  through  a  strategic  shift  in  nutrition  content  and  delivery  and  by  creation  of  a convergent  eco-system  to  develop  and  promote  practices  that  nurture  health,  wellness  and immunity.

Poshan  2.0  focuses  on  Maternal  Nutrition,  Infant  and  Young  Child  Feeding  Norms, Treatment  of  MAM/SAM  and  Wellness  through  AYUSH.  It  rests  on  the  pillars  of Convergence, Governance, and Capacity-building. POSHAN Abhiyaan is the key pillar for Outreach  and  covers  innovations  related  to  nutritional  support,  ICT  interventions,  Media Advocacy and Research, Community Outreach and Jan Andolan. Steps have been taken to improve nutritional quality and testing in  accredited labs, strengthen delivery and leverage technology under the 'Poshan Tracker', a robust ICT enabled platform to improve governance with  regard  to  real  time  monitoring  of  provisioning  of  supplementary  nutrition  for  prompt supervision and management of services.

Government  released  Streamlined  Guidelines  dated  13.1.2021  for  greater  transparency, accountability  and  quality  in  the  nutrition  support  programme  and  service  delivery.  These guidelines emphasize on ensuring the quality of supplementary nutrition, highlight roles and responsibilities of duty holders, IT enabled data management and monitoring, leveraging of traditional  knowledge  through  AYUSH,  procurement  and  convergence  for  achieving  good nutritional outcomes.

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