A new initiative in India is aimed at creating a repository of information about regional crops and dietary practices across the country—a “food atlas” called Bharatiya Poshan Krishi Kosh—so that policymakers, experts and communities can use it to promote nutritious local food.
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s India Research Center will partner with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation on the project, which is being spearheaded by India’s Ministry of Women and Child Development (WCD). The effort, announced by WCD in mid-November 2019, is part of a larger initiative called POSHAN Abhiyaan (the Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nutrition) which aims to eliminate malnutrition in India by 2022.
The World Bank estimates that malnutrition costs India roughly $10 billion each year in lost productivity, illness, and death. The country has one of the highest rates of childhood malnutrition in the world.
Read an Indian Express article: Poshan Abhiyaan promises to revive traditional food systems across the country while addressing malnutrition
Read a Hans India article: WCD to launch Bharatiya Poshan Krishi Kosh