Peer-reviewed article

Status of Child and Maternal Nutrition in the Coastal Regions of India

Anil Kumar, S. Tanuja, Dibakar Sarangi, Praveen Jakhar, Jyoti Nayak · 31 Dec 2023

Abstract

The nutritional status of children and women is a robust indicator of the well-being of society.The food habits of people are governed by the prevailing agricultural production systems which in turn govern the nutrient availability through food sources (Ghosh et. al., 2019;Wadhawan and Kaur, 2019).Malnutrition is an outcome of the imbalance of protein, energy and micronutrient deficiencies and it continues to be a major health concern in developing countries.The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of the United Nations has given a call to "end all forms of malnutrition by 2030 including achieving by 2025, the internationally agreed targets on stunting and wasting in children under 5 years of age" (Target 2.2).In 2022, an estimated 22.3% (148.1 million) of children under five years of age were stunted and 6.8% (45 million) were wasted globally (WHO, 2023).These figures are quite alarming in India.and about 36% of children in India below the age of five are stunted, 19% are wasted, 32% are underweight and an alarming 57% of women are anaemic.In the case of women, 19% of them are underweight in the reproductive age.About 57%