Africa Knowledge Hub for Children

Peer-reviewed articleOpenAlex15 Jun 2026

Maternal and Child Nutrition Interventions to Improve Child Nutritional Status: A Literature Review

Maternal and child malnutrition remains a major global public health challenge, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, where stunting, wasting, and micronutrient deficiencies persist despite ongoing nutrition programs. This narrative literature review synthesizes evidence on the effectiveness of maternal and child nutrition interventions implemented between 2015 and 2025 to improve child nutritional status. A structured literature search was conducted in PubMed, Scopus, ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar following general PRISMA principles. A total of 42 peer-reviewed articles were included and analyzed using thematic synthesis. Data extraction focused on study design, intervention components, target populations, and nutritional outcomes, including stunting, wasting, breastfeeding practices, and dietary diversity. Three major intervention themes were identified: maternal nutrition interventions, infant and young child feeding (IYCF) interventions, and integrated maternal-child nutrition programs. Maternal nutrition counselling and micronutrient supplementation were associated with improved birth outcomes and reduced risks of low birth weight and stunting. IYCF interventions, particularly exclusive breastfeeding promotion and complementary feeding education, improved dietary diversity and child growth indicators. Integrated maternal-child nutrition programs demonstrated the most consistent improvements across multiple nutritional outcomes. The findings emphasize the importance of strengthening integrated, community-based nutrition programs that support the continuum of care from pregnancy through early childhood. Further longitudinal and cost-effectiveness studies are needed to support large-scale implementation.

Yania Febsi, Sanya Anda Lusiana, Khaerul Fadly et al.

Policy documentOpenAlex - Early Childhood1 May 2018

A network for early childhood development

Political action and investment are critical to meet the development needs of vulnerable young children today. Early childhood development (ECD) has become a global priority: an ECD target and other ECD-related targets are included in the sustainable development goals, over 75 countries have officially adopted multisectoral ECD policy instruments, and ECD is a programmatic focus in major global institutions (including UNICEF, UNESCO, the WHO, and the World Bank). However, lack of clear and strong ownership of and champions for ECD, operational and communication siloes of constituent sectors that constitute ECD, political pressures for investment in other arenas, and low international investment in ECD inhibit making a compelling and cohesive investment case for ECD. This commentary explores how a global ECD network can facilitate systematic alignment and action across sectors to support country systems, strengthen political will, and increase investment to deliver results for young children's development. The ECD Action Network is in formation and offers an opportunity for the field to share knowledge among countries and sectors, identify pathways for sectoral coordination and collaboration, and undertake advocacy to generate the scale of political and financial support necessary to ensure that every child receives the nurturing care he/she needs.

Shekufeh Zonji

DevelopmentRead at source

Peer-reviewed articleOpenAlex29 Apr 2025

Understanding Stunting: Impact, Causes, and Strategy to Accelerate Stunting Reduction—A Narrative Review

Stunting is a major global health concern, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, due to its persistently high prevalence. It often originates from chronic malnutrition during the critical first 1000 days of life. Maternal and child nutrition are critical determinants of a child's growth and development. This article aimed to explore the impact, causes, and evidence-based strategies to accelerate the reduction of stunting incidence worldwide. This review was undertaken with sources from PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Science Direct, and MEDLINE from October 2024 to January 2025. This review was undertaken with sources from PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Science Direct, and MEDLINE from October 2024 to January 2025 using the keyword "Stunting", "Causes of stunting", "Stunting Impact", "Stunting Intervention", and "Stunting Prevention". The findings highlight the multifactorial causes of stunting, including maternal malnutrition, inadequate breastfeeding and complementary feeding, poor sanitation, and socioeconomic factors. Stunting is associated with impaired linear growth, cognitive deficits, gut dysbiosis, endocrine disruption, anemia, and increased risk of chronic diseases later in life. Addressing stunting demands multisectoral strategies focusing on maternal and child nutrition, infection prevention, improved WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) practices, and socioeconomic support. The evidence presented may guide policy development and targeted interventions to prevent stunting and its long-term effects.

Aisyah Tri Mulyani, Miski Aghnia Khairinisa, Alfi Khatib et al.

SurvivalDevelopmentIDMYRead at source

OtherOpenAlex - Early Childhood2 Jun 2018

EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT

Policymakers and practitioners are boosting support for families in the most disadvantaged areas to help pre-school children develop the skills they need to thrive and reduce the attainment gap

Derren Hayes

Read at source

Peer-reviewed articleOpenAlex - Early Childhood1 Jan 2018

The Macroeconomic Consequences of Early Childhood Development Policies

To study long-run large-scale early childhood policies, this paper incorporates early childhood investments into a standard general-equilibrium (GE) heterogeneous-agent overlapping-generations model.A er estimating it using US data, we show that an RCT evaluation of a short-run small-scale early childhood program in the model predicts effects on children's education and income that are similar to the empirical evidence.A long-run large-scale program, however, yields twice as large welfare gains, even a er considering GE and taxation effects.Key to this difference is that investing in a child not only improves her skills but also creates a be er parent for the next generation.

Diego Daruich

DevelopmentPractitionerCAUSRead at source

Project reportOpenAlex27 Nov 2025

Community Empowerment Through Increasing Child Nutrition Knowledge to Mitigate Stunting on Derawan Island, Berau Regency: Pemberdayaan Masyarakat Melalui Peningkatan Pengetahuan Gizi Anak Untuk Mitigasi Stunting di Pulau Derawan, Kabupaten Berau

Stunting is a chronic health issue caused by prolonged nutritional deficiencies, particularly during the first 1,000 days of life (HPK). In Kampung Pulau Derawan, Berau Regency, the stunting rate remains high despite the region's abundant marine resources such as fish. Low consumption of animal protein and vegetables, along with limited community knowledge on balanced nutrition, are the main contributing factors. The "Let’s Eat Fish" and "Let’s Eat Vegetables" campaigns are educational interventions implemented by community service students from Universitas Mulawarman to raise nutritional awareness. These programs targeted early childhood students, teachers, and parents through presentations, interactive discussions, visual media, and the distribution of supplementary foods (PMT) based on local ingredients. The results indicate that nutrition education rooted in community empowerment successfully fostered healthy eating habits, improved nutritional knowledge, and strengthened sustainable stunting prevention efforts. This initiative also involved collaborative efforts between students, local authorities, health workers, and the community through a stunting discussion forum (rembuk stunting), ensuring the program was contextually relevant and community-driven.

Rosyid Nurrohman, Deya Deya, Indry Nur Amalia et al.

SurvivalDevelopmentPractitionerIDRead at source

Peer-reviewed articleOpenAlex - Early Childhood11 Feb 2019

Challenges in Early Childhood Development

This Viewpoint describes the significance of early childhood development (ECD) and the global challenges many clinicans face and proposes approaches and objectives for governments to reach to scale up ECD.

Kemin Qi

DevelopmentCNRead at source

Project reportOpenAlex - Early Childhood1 Oct 2021

Early Childhood Development, Human Capital and Poverty

Children's experiences during early childhood are critical for their cognitive and socio-emotional development, two key dimensions of human capital.However, children from low income backgrounds often grow up lacking stimulation and basic investments, leading to developmental deficits that are difficult, if not impossible, to reverse later in life without intervention.The existence of these deficits are a key driver of inequality and contribute to the intergenerational transmission of poverty.In this paper, we discuss the framework used in economics to model parental investments and early childhood development and use it as an organizing tool to review some of the empirical evidence on early childhood research.We then present results from various important early childhoods interventions with emphasis on developing countries.Bringing these elements together we draw conclusions on what we have learned and provide some directions for future research.

Orazio Attanasio, Sarah Cattan, Costas Meghir

DevelopmentSurvivalGBUSRead at source

Peer-reviewed articleOpenAlex9 Feb 2022

In-utero Ramadan Exposure and Child Nutrition

In this study, we analyse if in-utero exposure to Ramadan fasting period is negatively associated with child nutrition? The data for the analyses come from a retrospective assessment of 924,198 children from 103 demographic and health surveys (DHS) across 56 countries during the period 2003-2020. Considering the month-long Ramadan exposure as a natural experiment, we implement an intent-to-treat framework, comparing outcomes among individuals who were exposed to Ramadan at any time in-utero to those who were not exposed. Our findings do not show significant evidence to conclude that in-utero exposure to Ramadan fasting period is negatively associated with child nutrition. On the contrary, except for stunting in children who had in-utero exposure to Ramadan during the first trimester, among Muslims, we find slightly better nutritional outcomes among children exposed in-utero to Ramadan period. The better nutritional outcomes among children exposed in-utero can be attributed to high nutritious food intake and better hygienic practices during holy months of Ramadan compared to usual months. Our main results are robust to multiple robustness checks.

Hoi Chu, Srinivas Goli, Anu Rammohan

SurvivalPractitionerAUINRead at source

Project reportOpenAlex - Early Childhood1 Apr 2022

Investing in Early Childhood Development in Preschool and at Home

The foundations for successful child development are established in early childhood.Two main policy approaches for strengthening these foundations have been subsidized preschool programs and programs targeting the home environment.Our chapter reviews a large body of empirical work investigating whether these programs make a difference for children's development, and if so, how and under what conditions do they help, how cost-effective are they, and which programs are scalable.We start by reviewing studies that estimate how much of the variation in child outcomes can be explained by genetics versus environmental factors.These studies demonstrate that variation in environmental factors plays a key role in explaining individual life outcomes.This suggests that early childhood programs might play a significant role in helping children realize their potential in life.Nevertheless, our review of early childhood programs demonstrates that the evidence is mixed -some programs are successful in fostering lasting skill development, but many are not.We conclude that existing research on early childhood education falls short of sufficiently answering fundamental questions about what works for whom and why.A tighter link between theory, econometric methods and data is essential to compare and reconcile the mixed and sometimes conflicting empirical results across studies, and to understand when and why the impacts of home environment and pre-school interventions fadeout.

Greg J. Duncan, Ariel Kalil, Magne Mogstad et al.

DevelopmentUSNORead at source

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