Alausa seeks stronger education role in fight against child malnutrition

The Minister of Education, Dr Olatunji Alausa, has called for a stronger role for the education sector in tackling child malnutrition through school feeding, school health and nutrition education.

A statement signed by the Minister’s Special Adviser on Media and Communications, Ikharo Attah, on Thursday, said Alausa made the call at the Ethiopia-Nigeria Leadership Exchange on Moving the Needle on Nutrition in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Speaking during a session on Building the Multi-Sectoral Framework on Wednesday, Alausa stressed the need for stronger collaboration among ministries and across the three tiers of government to ensure nutrition interventions reach children and families at the community level.

He said tackling malnutrition requires coordinated action across education, health, agriculture, planning, and other sectors, backed by clear responsibilities, adequate financing, and effective monitoring.

Alausa said the Nutrition 774 Initiative provided an opportunity to translate national nutrition priorities into practical interventions across the country’s 774 local government areas.

He identified school feeding as a key intervention, saying linking it with school participation could help improve children’s nutrition while addressing barriers to school attendance and retention.

The Minister also highlighted integrating nutrition-related studies into the revised school curriculum to equip children with knowledge of healthy eating, wellbeing, and healthy lifestyles.

According to the statement, the Federal Ministry of Education’s proposed contribution to the initiative includes school feeding, school health, nutrition education and measures to improve access to quality education and school participation.

The interventions are expected to form part of local government multisectoral plans of action for food and nutrition, with education indicators proposed for inclusion in the initiative’s local government scorecard.

Alausa also called for greater attention to early childhood care and development beyond the first 1,000 days of life, stressing the need to sustain support through the wider period of early growth and development.

He identified reliable, integrated data as essential to effective planning and delivery, saying better data would help authorities identify communities in need, target interventions, and monitor their impact.

The Minister said the Ministry’s proposed interventions were aligned with the National Policy on Food and Nutrition, which seeks to increase school-feeding coverage from 33 per cent to 60 per cent of primary school children by 2035.

He reaffirmed the Ministry’s commitment to working with relevant ministries, state and local governments and development partners to strengthen education-related interventions under the Nutrition 774 Initiative.

Alausa said improving children’s nutrition and access to quality education was essential to building a healthier and better-educated population.

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