The wife of the president, Mrs Aisha Buhari, has accepted to become the National Nutrition Ambassador to champion the cause of over 2.5 million malnourished children in Nigeria, the Minister of State, Ministry of Budget and National Planning, Mrs Zainab Ahmed, said yesterday.
She said at a news conference to mark the beginning of the maiden edition of Nutrition Week in Nigeria that the president’s wife would today launch the revised National Policy on Food and Nutrition to reduce the number of people who suffer hunger and malnutrition by 50 percent by 2025 and increase exclusive breastfeeding feeding rate from 17 percent to 65 percent by 2025.
“It is alarming that 53 percent of our children under five die annually due to malnutrition. This is 1,200 children a day,” she said.
The Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said the federal government realised that malnutrition was a crisis in the North-east which was worsened by the activities of Boko Haram.
He said about 260,000 children were malnourished in the region, a development he said, called for concern and action.
He said the federal government was working to address the crisis, stop open defecation, improve nutrition and general hygiene.
