Can nutrition related millennium development goals be achieved? Exploring the inter-linkages between nutrition, poverty, socio-economic development and literacy

An estimated 852 million people around the world do not have access to adequate food to lead a healthy life. By understanding the severity of nutrition and the long term impact it has, reducing hunger was included as one of the development goals under the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The goal is to reduce hunger by half over the period 1990-2015. Improvement in nutritional status will not only help attain the MDGs directly related to nutrition and hunger but also help attain the other MDGs thus accelerating the improvements in non-nutrition development objectives.

Objectives for this study include (1) understanding correlations among nutrition and other MDGs to examine the potential inter-linkages among the indicators, (2) examining the income elasticity of poverty and poverty elasticity of child nutritional status, and (3) studying the effect of literacy and other developmental factors on hunger and nutritional status. The elasticity estimates will indicate what impact economic progress might have on poverty and how changes in poverty will affect child nutritional and hunger status, with or without changes in related MDG indicators. Data for this study was mapped from various United Nation reports, millennium development data sheets, and country's statistics bureau. Correlation coefficients were obtained between nutritional status and other developmental indicators. Prevalence of malnutrition elasticity is estimated for countries across different regions. Simulation exercises are conducted to capture the effect of economic growth, literacy and other factors on child nutrition and hunger.

Preliminary results for the Africa region show that (1) elasticity of child malnutrition of poverty is + 0.241 hence 23.5% decline in poverty will reduce child malnutrition by 5.66%, (2) 2004/5 prevalence of malnutrition in Africa was 29% - over the next 10 years, 23.5% reduction in poverty will reduce malnutrition rate to 27.36%,(3) Poverty reduction alone will reduce malnutrition rate by 14.1% to 24.9% much higher than the target of 16.5% malnutrition prevalence rate in 2015, and (4) economic growth alone will not be enough to achieve the first MDG target on poverty reduction. Results from other countries and regions will further highlight inter-linkages and importance of social and developmental indicators in achieving the child nutrition and hunger related MDGs.