Abstract
Malnutrition, which encompasses both undernutrition and overnutrition, presents a significanthuman capital as well as economic development challenge across most ASEAN Member States.A healthy, well-nourished, well-educated and skillful population provides the foundation for aproductive life and enables future workers to compete in the dynamic labor markets of digitaleconomies. However, most of ASEAN's lower-income countries face an unfinished agenda withregard to undernutrition. Undernutrition elevates the risk of infant and child morbidity andmortality, increases expenditure on health care and social safety nets, lowers the efficiency ofinvestments in education, and decreases lifelong income-earning potential and labor forceproductivity, with the potential to be transmitted across generations. Estimates for some ASEANmember states show undernutrition resulting in annual losses of between 2.4 percent - 4.4 percent of GDP Overnutrition compounds the challenges. Overnutrition is posing an increasing challenge to ASEAN, with some countries having high prevalence of obesity and overweight. In the last 35 years obesity prevalence across ASEAN increased over 7-fold, most rapidly in Cambodia, Indonesia, and Lao PDR, where obesity rates have risen more than 10-fold. Childhood overweight and obesity is likewise a growing problem, especially in Brunei, Malaysia, and Thailand where childhood overweight prevalence exceeds 25 percent. Overweight and obesity among ASEAN member states have high direct costs for some countries, for example in Brunei it is 16. Direct health care costs related to treatment of obesity and associated chronic diseases due to obesity as well as indirect costs, particularly from the loss of labor productivity, are expected to increase in many ASEAN countries.
Highlights
As the ASEAN Chair in 2019, Thailand wishes to further contribute to our Leaders’ shared goal in addressing this issue in a sustainable and inclusive manner by promoting an effective, collaborative and multi-sectoral approach and fostering partnerships within ASEAN and with external partners
Direct health care costs related to treatment of obesity and associated chronic diseases due to obesity are expected to increase in many ASEAN countries
Undernutrition remains highly prevalent in many ASEAN Member States, despite decades of strong economic growth and poverty reduction
Summary
Malnutrition, which encompasses both undernutrition and overnutrition, presents a significant human capital as well as economic development challenge across most ASEAN Member States. These include specific recommendations to improve nutrition information by regulating food marketing and improving food labeling, scaling up nutrition education, embark on media-based behavior change programs, regulating food composition through industry-focused policies, and encouraging dietary changes through targeted taxes, subsidies, and urban planning These countries need to improve primary health care delivery system to detect non-communicable diseases (NCDs), diagnoses and case management. Countries in the region must make targeted investments in nutrition programs ( in early life), in health, social protection, agriculture, and education, and develop the frameworks to promote healthy diets and physical activity This will help create a healthy workforce capable of adapting to the rapidly changing global economic landscape. It is crucial that the implementation progress is regularly tracked and that any lack of progress is addressed promptly
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