The National Food and Nutrition Commission -NFNC- has embarked on a Food and Nutrition survey to collect national data that will help in the design of appropriate nutrition programmes.
Commission Senior Nutritionist, Belinda Tembo says the food consumption survey will help government collect information that will help promote consumption of healthier foods.
Mrs. Tembo says with rising cases of diseases in the country due to obesity, there is need for the country to have data that is trustworthy and nationally representative.
She said presently, the country has no conclusive data on the number of obesity cases though, the Zambia Demographic and Health Survey indicates that incidences of obesity have risen from 19 to 23 per cent among women of child bearing age.
Mrs. Tembo said the survey will seek to look at food and dietary patterns in the country that will be used to design programmes that will promote better food and nutrition practices.
She has urged Zambians to desist from junk foods and eat lots of greens and traditional foods as well as change food preparation methods.
Mrs. Tembo said the commission expects the survey results to be ready by the end of the year and results disseminated next year.
She further affirmed that the commission will embark on a campaign to promote the good food logo on locally produced foods to guide the public on which foods to buy on the local market.
She said the World Food Programme has since come on board to support the roll out of the good food logo campaign.
Ya we need this in Zambia.
These are the commissions, not those useless commissions we have seen before like “commission of elections violence”.
No need to waste money on this survey. A cheaper study you can do is to colerrate ARVs to obesity. You will see that most of the obesity patients are on ARVs.
My question is what will be the mitigation measures?
When they kill people in Namwala “We need no Commision to check on our tribalism trends.”
Nshima has ruined Zambia as staple food ,we should go back to cassava ,sweet potatoes ,whole grains green vegetables ,fruits and various nuts.
obesity in child bearing aged women is not because they eat well but mainly due to substandard contraceptives. zambia is a second hand country; second hand clothes, cars, food, medicines etc
Delele is good for those with excessive uric acid leading to painful joints. Wrong or right?
Are you saying we shut Hungry Lion iliko tricky
Only those of us who ‘re in de nutrition arena & those out there who appreciate de goodness of nutrition can understand the importance of this survey