Profile of the public health nutrition workforce in high burden stunting countries: Limiting and supporting factors

Objective: Most countries with the highest burden of stunting have a severe shortage of human resources and are unable to deliver quality, basic nutrition or health services. A profile analysis of the nutrition workforce is underway in five high burden stunting countries. The objective of the analysis is to outline which frontline workers are tasked with implementing the high-impact nutrition interventions defined in the Lancet Series on Maternal and Child Undernutrition (2008).

Methods: Five countries across different regions were selected to provide a wide range in geographic location as well as to understand the various contexts of workforce development. The SPRING project developed a web-based database that will be used to map trends and patterns across countries.

Results: Initial findings suggest that a wide range of health providers, community workers and agriculture extension workers are involved in delivering high-impact nutrition services in the five countries. However, much is not known about skill-mix, the attributes and the competencies of these workers. One reason is the scarcity of such data at the country level. Another reason is the lack of clarity on the types of activities that are classified as “public health nutrition” by health, agriculture and community development workers.

Conclusion: System strengthening, in particular workforce development represents a key element to address in nutrition programming as it allows countries to provide evidence‐based systematic approaches with sufficient numbers of skilled workers to serve communities with diverse nutrition needs.