Making School Meals More Nutritious

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News and Insights

February/March 2022

Op-Ed: Nutritious School Meals for Africa’s Children

On the 7th African Day of School Feeding, Dr. Ibrahim Mayaki of AUDA-NEPAD, Nane Annan of the Kofi Annan Foundation, and HarvestPlus CEO Arun Baral jointly urged African governments to expand home-grown school feeding programs benefiting children as well as farming households, and incorporate biofortified foods in these programs. MORE...

HarvestPlus, Akshaya Patra Integrate Biofortified Foods in India’s School Meals

Akshaya Patra is an NGO that reaches 2 million children through India’s Mid-day Meals Scheme. With HarvestPlus, they will pilot introduction of nutritious iron pearl millet and zinc wheat in these meals. MORE...

Working with Indian Women Agripreneurs to Improve Nutrition and Livelihoods

Under the CBC Programme, HarvestPlus and Grameen Foundation India will work with “Grameen Mittras” to engage farmers and farmer organizations to grow zinc-biofortified wheat, in a pilot in Uttar Pradesh state.
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Video: Advancing Nutrient-Enriched Crops in Malawi

This TV feature describes how multiple partners are creating sustainable value chains for vitamin A maize and iron beans.

Supporting SMEs: A Successful Zinc Rice Mill in Bangladesh

Through a Government of Canada-funded project, Muhammed Motaher Khan and his family have grown their Du Vai Auto Rice Mill in the Thakurgaon district of Bangladesh into a thriving business that mills zinc rice and employs more than 300 people. MORE...

Other Items of Interest

An article in Vox.com looks at the possible repercusscuions of the war in Ukraine on global food prices and supplies, particularly in the Global South. In 2020, the largest importers of wheat from Ukraine were Egypt, Turkey, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Pakistan; many African countries are big importers of Russian wheat.

In the February issue of India’s Agro Spectrum (see pp. 35-36), Ravinder Grover, HarvestPlus Project Manager for the CBC Programme, explains how new product standards for biofortified grains will spur their rapid expansion.

Tanzania’s new National Multisectoral Nutrition Action Plan covering 2021-22 through 2025-26 includes biofortification as a key intervention for improving nutrition for children, adolescents, and adults. Tanzania, a leader in creating biofortification enabling environments, previously issued detailed national biofortification guidelines.

The How We Made It in Africa website featured Nigerian biofortified food entrepreneur Pelumi Aribisala, CEO and co-founder of Cato Foods, who discusses how they are ramping up output to meet strong demand amid supply, logistics, and financing challenges.

The latest IPCC Climate Change report highlighted risks from rising carbon dioxide concentrations and other climate effects to food systems, including reduced productivity and nutrient content of food crops, raising food and nutrition insecurity and disease burdens.

A joint HarvestPlus-GAIN discussion paper looks at the complementarity of biofortification and large-scale food fortification in addressing micronutrient malnutrition and improving food systems.