Nutritional Knowledge, Practices and Challenges of Food and Nutrition Security in the Tharparkar, Sindh, Pakistan

Abstract

Background: Nutrition is a fundamental need of human beings worldwide. Hunger has increased rapidly all over the world and reached a high level with more than one billion people living with chronic hunger. Objective: The main objective of the proposed study was to identify the challenges of food and nutrition insecurity. Methods: The research team conducted interviews in the respective union councils (UCs) with support of the field team, and subsequently collected and analyzed the data. Results and Discussion: The findings of the present study indicated that 32% of households gave their children food/fluids within one month, followed by breastfeeding. About 81% breastfeeding practice is strictly followed at the household level. Only 23%, 22%, 27% and 28% of children with the ages between 6 and 23 months were given one, two, three and four meals, respectively. The data indicates that about 11% of children faced issues during their feeding practices, while 89% of children did not face any feeding issues. The majority of pregnant and lactating women (PLWs) reported that they did not receive any additional food. The consumption of fresh vegetables and fruits was around 30% twice in a week. The vegetables and fruits, including watermelon, jujube, peroon, singari, pipoon, musk melon, keria and gangheti, were cultivated, which are solely dependent on the seasonal rain. The diseases, such as respiratory diseases, skin diseases, cardiac disease, malaria, dengue and mental illness, were reported; whereas, measles and night blindness were not reported in the selected area. Conclusion: There is a need of spreading the message through media at the district and province levels with the involvement of multi-stakeholders, so that the efforts are synergized to have a sustainable and long-term impact.