Expanding Nutrients in Food Systems

Foods grown from biofortified seeds provide a high dose of vitamin A zinc and iron – the essential nutrients needed to maintain a healthy and diversified diet. Biofortification is also a cost-effective and innovative nutrition solution to micronutrient deficiency or hidden hunger which affects over 2.5 billion people globally and contributes to increased acute malnutrition in 173 million adults and 11.6 million children in food-insecure regions globally. This Global Affairs Canada-funded four-year Expanding Nutrients in Food Systems (ENFS) project aims to increase the consumption of nutritious biofortified food by over 11 million men women and children in food-insecure regions across Bangladesh India Pakistan Uganda and Zimbabwe. Project activities will also increase the consumption of biofortified foods by vulnerable women girls and children under five and household income by women and women-led small to medium-sized enterprises. Beneficiaries of this project will benefit from strengthened gender equality in decision-making and control over the use of biofortified seeds and food. The project occurs in the five programming countries' rural and economically disadvantaged regions. Itand will target communities with high micronutrient deficiency rates and food insecurity due to the compound effects of climate change increased cost of food and ongoing COVID-19 disruptions. The project will focus on sustainability by building the capacity of local stakeholders and scaling biofortification for food systems transformation and local value chains to provide access to affordable healthy diets. Target beneficiaries will include low-income consumers vulnerable food-insecure people (especially women and children) and smallholder farmers.

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) Increased adoption and production of biofortified crop varieties by vulnerable smallholder farmers especially women; (2) Increased consumption of biofortified foods by vulnerable women girls and children under five; and (3) Strengthened gender equality in decision making and control of the use of biofortified seed and food.