Nigeria is still struggling to reverse malnutrition, with 41.1 per cent of children under five suffering from stunting, rising to 58. 2 per cent in the North- West, the Nutrition Society of Nigeria (NSN) has said.
The Society also disclosed that only 25.3 per cent of children under five received any iron-containing supplements in the past year, while only six per cent of pregnant women completed at least 180 days of iron-containing supplementation in 2024.
The figures were disclosed at the 56th Scientific Conference and Annual General Meeting of the NSN in Lagos on Tuesday.
The Vice President of Nigeria, Kashima Shettima, represented by the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Health and Focal Person on Nutrition in the Office of the Vice President, Mrs Uju Rochas- Anwukah, said the low coverage of iron supplementation among pregnant women was far below the national target of 70 per cent by 2035.
He also said only 30 per cent of women of reproductive age achieved minimum dietary diversity, against a national target of 60 per cent by 2035.
Shettima warned that the figures reflected the scale of Nigeria’s nutrition challenge and its implications for human capital development.
He said nutrition policies should be judged by their impact on people’s lives rather than by the number of policies and regulations produced.
“Policy fails when it treats those stages as separate rooms,” she said, calling for nutrition interventions to be treated as a continuum from childhood through adolescence and adulthood.
Shettima identified anaemia as one of the consequences of poor nutrition, saying it weakens women and children, worsens pregnancy outcomes, reduces learning capacity and ultimately affects national productivity.
The Vice President called for stronger coordination among the health, agriculture, education, social protection, water and sanitation sectors, as well as greater involvement of the private sector and local governments.
He said the Nutrition 774 initiative remained the government’s framework for taking nutrition interventions to all 774 local government areas.
Rochas- Anwukah also urged the government to use the national nutrition dashboard as an accountability tool and ensure that nutrition programmes were assessed based on measurable outcomes.
She said food fortification should be assessed by its contribution to reducing micronutrient deficiencies, rather than merely by the number of regulations issued.
“Good intentions do not feed a child,” she said, demanding timely release of nutrition funds and measurable accountability for public expenditure.
Emir demands protected nutrition funding
The Chairman of the NSN Board of Trustees, Emir of Kano, Khalifa Muhammad Sanusi II, called for nutrition to be treated as a central component of Nigeria’s development and human-capital agenda rather than a programme activated only during crises.
Sanusi said ending malnutrition required a shift from fragmented interventions to coordinated systems, short-term projects to sustained investment, and policy commitments to measurable accountability.
He said government must connect evidence to policy, policy to financing, financing to implementation and implementation to the lives of Nigerians.
According to him, the latest Nigeria Mini-Demographic and Health Survey showed that 41.1 per cent of children under five were stunted, with 19.2 per cent severely stunted, while stunting reached 58.2 per cent in the North-West.
He said the figures should guide government decisions, budgets and interventions rather than simply being presented as statistics.
Sanusi called for increased and protected nutrition financing through dedicated budget lines, timely fund releases, and expenditure tracking.
He also urged government to scale up proven interventions, including maternal nutrition, breastfeeding support, micronutrient supplementation and food fortification, through routine systems rather than isolated projects.
The traditional ruler called for intensified food fortification compliance and quality assurance, dietary diversification and stronger consumer protection.
He also urged the National Assembly to urgently pass the Nutritionists Registration Council of Nigeria Bill to provide a statutory framework for regulating the nutrition profession.
Sanusi called for accelerated action in the North-West and other high-burden states, saying equity should be placed at the centre of Nigeria’s nutrition response.
He also advocated stronger nutrition surveillance and evidence translation so that findings from national surveys could drive state-specific interventions.
Nigeria cannot depend on donor funding — Muhtar
The keynote speaker, Dr Mansur Muhtar, called for greater domestic financing of nutrition, warning that Nigeria could not continue to depend heavily on development partners as global funding priorities shift.
Muhtar said development partners and philanthropists had made significant contributions to nutrition programmes, but Nigeria must increasingly mobilise its own resources to sustain interventions.
He called for sufficient government allocations to nutrition and protection of such funds from political and fiscal risks.
According to him, expanding the domestic resource base must be accompanied by smarter spending, with every naira allocated to nutrition subjected to measurable performance and impact assessment.
He also advocated innovative financing mechanisms to attract private capital into nutrition programmes.
Muhtar said the private sector could contribute through responsible investment, corporate social responsibility and support for food systems, while government remained responsible for creating the policy and regulatory environment.
He stressed that financing alone would not solve Nigeria’s nutrition crisis, insisting that funds must translate into effective programmes and healthier communities.
“Financing is not an end in itself,” he said, stressing the need for accountability, transparency, monitoring and reporting of outcomes.
Muhtar also called for stronger collaboration among government, parliament, the private sector, civil society, academia, media, traditional institutions and communities.
He said traditional rulers and religious leaders had an important role in changing community behaviours around nutrition because they command trust and influence at the grassroots.
Katsina spends N1.7bn on nutrition
Meanwhile, Katsina State Government has spent N1.7 billion on targeted nutrition interventions as part of efforts to reduce malnutrition among vulnerable families, the state’s Deputy Governor, Faruk Lawal Jobe, said.
Jobe, who represented Governor Dikko Umar Radda at the conference, said the state had also spent more than N30 billion on food and other support for vulnerable households.
He said nutrition was not merely a health issue but an economic issue because poor nutrition affects productivity and human capital.
The deputy governor said Katsina had introduced six months of paid maternity leave to support exclusive breastfeeding and scaled up iron and folic acid supplementation for pregnant women.
He said more than 1,000 healthcare workers and 600 community volunteers had also been trained on maternal, infant and young child nutrition.
Jobe disclosed that 271 of the state’s 361 wards had had their primary healthcare centres upgraded and equipped, while the remaining facilities were expected to be completed before the end of the administration.
He said the state was also establishing a local nutrition food factory to produce nutritious food for children and had allocated funds for a nutrition survey to improve evidence-based planning.
The NSN President, Prof. Salisu Maiwada Abubakar, said Nigeria’s nutrition profile remained a warning that required urgent action.
He said wasting had declined to 4.7 per cent according to the 2025–26 Mini-DHS, but chronic malnutrition remained entrenched, with 19.2 per cent of children under five severely stunted.
Abubakar said almost half of women of reproductive age were anaemic and only about one-third achieved minimum dietary diversity.
He called for stronger implementation of the National Policy on Food and Nutrition 2026–2035 and the Nutrition 774 initiative.
The conference, attended by policymakers, researchers, development partners, civil society organisations and private-sector stakeholders, was held under the theme, “Delivering Better Nutrition for All: Connecting the Dots Across Life Cycles, Systems and Sectors.”
Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info).