Biofortification (or nutrient enrichment) of staple crops has the potential to contribute to reducing micronutrient deficiencies by increasing micronutrient intakes. In 2019, GAIN and HarvestPlus entered a partnership to lead the Commercialisation of Biofortified Crops (CBC) Programme, which aims to catalyse commercial markets for biofortified crops in six countries across Africa and Asia.
Micronutrient deficiencies are a public health challenge in Bangladesh. Many children, women, and vulnerable populations are not getting the nutrients they need for proper brain development, immunity, and physical and mental health. Together with diversified diets, large scale food fortification has the potential to make a significant impact on micronutrient deficiency in Bangladesh.
Accelerated digitalization is one of the most significant growth engines for developing nations. With technology driving increased sales and profits globally, a digital quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC) system for food fortification in Bangladesh will open THREE paths to greater efficiency and enhanced financial performance for fortified food producers.
Monitoring the quality of fortified foods has traditionally been a manual, time-consuming process, which relies primarily on sporadic testing once products have reached the market. A partnership of international specialists and experts is working with Bangladesh’s food producers to develop a platform of sensors and software, enabling oversight of the production process and product quality.
Nigeria suffers from extreme levels of micronutrient deficiencies affecting the health, death rates, brain and physical development of the majority of Nigerians.To assess this existing evidence, and the remaining data gaps, this State of the Nation review provides a multi-sectoral analysis of all the available data from the last 10 years, from 2012 to 2021.
Timely, actionable data is essential to the success of national large scale food fortification (LSFF) programmes. Most low and middle income (LMIC) countries currently rely on national surveys to inform their LSFF programmes. These national surveys are expensive and infrequent, making it difficult to assess quality and impact.
David Morgan, Senior Technical Specialist for Quality and Safety at GAIN, spoke on Intertek's Assurance in Action Podcast about the GAIN Premix Facility, what it is and how it works.
Too many people across Bangladesh are living with zinc deficiency. One proven and effective way to tackle this is through scaling up production and consumption of rice biofortified with zinc.
With the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, GAIN is leading implementation of a pilot programme to develop a digitized system to ensure staple foods are fortified with the right levels of essential vitamins and minerals to support good health and nutrition. The system will also track the fortified foods to ensure they are reaching Nigerian consumers efficiently.
An estimated 2 billion people globally are affected by micronutrient deficiencies, while around one third of the global population is at risk of at least one micronutrient deficiency. Micronutrient deficiencies, also known as hidden hunger, can be linked to significant disease burden and economic loss.
