Internationally, food companies have been consulting on measures to reduce micronutrients deficiencies, including voluntary or mandatory fortification of certain foods. In Nigeria, various foods such as breakfast cereals, juices and cooking products are being fortified. The recently-released Micronutrient Fortification Index (MFI) demonstrated how big food companies are producing fortified staples and food items to fight malnutrition. Through fortification, they are increasing the content of essential micronutrients in food, DANIEL ESSIET reports.
Nigeria is home to one in three of the world’s malnourished children, according to analysts.
This has been attributed, in part, to high food costs, preventing many lower-income families from healthy eating.
For this reason, the Regional Director West Africa, TechnoServe, Larry Umunna, said Nigerians were suffering from a deficiency of vitamin A, vitamin D, zinc, iron and calcium – essential elements that play significant roles in proper development and well-being of the body.
At a three-day Nigeria AgroFood/PlastPrintPack Exhibition and Conference in Lagos, Umunna said the importance of micronutrients could not be overstated, lamenting that there was still limited awareness among the public on the need to up their intake, especially in children.
He noted that a large part of the population consumes less than half the daily recommended dietary allowance of micronutrients.
He also maintained that Nigeria did not have good statistics when on nutrition as about 22 per cent of children under five are stunted, adding that two out of every five children in Nigeria did not have access to quality nutritious food.
According to him, there are increasing cases of children and adults suffering high levels of malnourishment due, in part, to poor food quality that lacks micronutrients.
Despite their potential, he observed that fortified foods in Nigeria had still not reached most markets.
Consequently, he advocated that the government and private sector stepped up actions to address severe micronutrients deficiencies among the population.
To boost food fortification, Umunna said the organisation and other partners established Micronutrient Fortification Index (MFI), an industry-owned, independently verified public ranking of companies’ relative performance in fortifying wheat flour, edible oil, sugar, and salt.
A key feature of MFI, he noted, was that it is a self-assessment tool (SAT) which each participating company managed and updated at intervals.
By sharing information publicly on its website, Umunna said MFI had helped to promote competitive business practices and incentivised the private sector to adopt fortification.
One of the central elements of the MFI, according to him, is the Industry Expert Group (IEG), a body of experts drawn from stakeholder groups. The group, he continued, represented buyers/consumers, related industry representatives, researchers, public health, and regulatory experts.
According to Umunna, IEG provides intelligence-based and informed ratings, views, opinions, advice, and recommendations to the MFI Governing Board about the compliance and effectiveness of participating companies and their standards and quality management.
He described MFI as one of the most successful and accountable strategies for sustainability, noting that Kenya was set to replicate the country’s achievement.
MFI, a self-regulatory system designed to incentivise food processors to meet government standards for fortifying products with essential vitamins and minerals, was designed through Strengthening African Processors of Fortified Foods (SAPFF) programme.
SAPFF takes a holistic approach to addressing those technical challenges and works to strengthen the enabling environment that promotes the competitive, healthy and effective production of fortified foods.
The $10 million initiative is a partnership between TechnoServe and Partners in Food Solutions (PFS) – a non-profit organisation that links the technical and business expertise of volunteer employees from General Mills,Cargill, Royal DSM, Bühler, Ardent Mills, and The Hershey Company. Utilising a market-based approach, it will help food companies in Nigeria, Kenya and Tanzania to increase the availability of nutritious foods by improving their capacity to produce and sell fortified foods for local markets.
Since SAPFF began four years ago, Nigeria’s supply of fortified wheat flour and sugar has increased by 68 per cent and 200 per cent, enabling over 90 per cent of the country’s population to access the products.
Umunna said TechnoServe was an international organisation that believes in the power to transform lives and was driving the campaign to increase the adoption of food fortification, considered one of the most cost-effective, scalable, and proven strategies to tackle micronutrient deficiencies.
He stated that the private sector has a long role to play in ensuring that the country brings down undesirable statistics to the barest minimum.
The Minister of Trade and Investment, Otunba Niyi Adebayo, reiterated the need for the government to work with the private sector and other stakeholders to improve nutrition, health and growth by supporting large-scale food fortification.
According to him, the government is interested in a holistic approach to promoting large-scale food fortification that puts businesses at the core of the solution.
He said the regime supported access to fortified foods by fostering collaboration and action among key stakeholders across the food system.
He commended Techno Serve’s role in supporting food processors to ensure they receive the technical assistance needed to integrate food fortification into their operations.
The Minister had earlier told the forum that the government was ready to expand food related cold chain capability to handle a wide range of food products.
A key focus,he stressed, was to set up a cold-chain logistics network that is wide-ranging, efficient, secure and inexpensive to establish and maintain.
According to him, the food industry had immense growth potential with ample room for technological growth to reach international standards.
So far, public-private partnerships in food fortification have helped to address hidden hunger or micronutrient deficiencies.
The Lagos State Commissioner for Agriculture, Ms Abisola Olusanya, called for collaboration with critical stakeholders in Nigeria’s agro-food industry to address the challenges in the sector.
Olusanya called for concerted efforts to discourage the practice where stakeholders work in isolation.
She said: “I say this, particularly for the agro-food sector. The biggest challenge we have is our market. We have a lot of farmers and they make up over 70 per cent of the sector, but we must work together to give them access to the market.
“You may recall that last year, the Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, flagged off the construction of the largest Food Security Systems and Central Logistics Park in sub-Saharan Africa being built on 1.2 million square metres of land in Ketu-Ereyun, Epe.
“Transactions on food items in Lagos are estimated to be N5 trillion yearly, just as farmers daily lose 40 per cent of produce worth millions due to lack of post-harvest storage system.
“So, the whole idea of the project is to guarantee greater returns for farmers and investors in the agro-allied sector, as the facility would cut out several layers of middlemen and facilitate improved access to modern processing and packaging services,” Olusanya said.
According to her, Lagos wants to build a network of cold-chain logistics corridors that link its clusters and major agricultural production areas and amplify the role of key logistics bases and distribution centres.
To ensure that players in the food and agro-allied industry fortify their products with essential micronutrients to tackle the burden of malnutrition,TechnoServe later awarded firms improving in food fortification requirements.
Flour Mills of Nigeria (FMN), Raffles, PZ Wilmar, Crown Flour Mills Olam and Dufil Foods are the firms whose products made the top 10 of the 2023 MFI and recognised by TechnoServe for their contributions to food fortification.
“Today we are recognising private companies that have adhered to fortification standards and maintained improved food fortification compliance levels,” said Country Director, TechnoServe, Adesuwa Akinboro.
She stated that large-scale food fortification is important, especially in a country with a population as large as Nigeria and with a high rate of malnutrition and under-nutrition, adding that it is one of the most cost effective ways of ensuring it benefits a large population of people.
In explaining what MFI means, she said the index is designed mainly to incentivise private sector companies to fortify their products for three main reasons – public recognition, providing a level playing field for all companies to ensure fortification compliance, and incentivising companies to improve and maintain high fortification standards.
She noted that TechnoServe, through its market-based and industry-led Programme –SAPFF, worked with partners to redefine the unsatisfactory narrative of large-scale food fortification in the country.
According to her, SAPFF has since evolved into the Technical Assistance Acceleration Programme (TAAP) project, which is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to work with global supply chain partners in the food fortification space to create a platform for private-public partnerships that will drive sustainability of large-scale fortification.
She congratulated CEOs and private sector companies that received the awards for their hard work and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for its financial support that has made the TAAP project and MFI awards possible.
Among the 10 top brands listed, five got recognition. FMN won the first and second positions with its – Classic All Purpose Flour and Golden Penny Prime Flour; Dufil Foods won the third position with its Power Oil and PZ Wilmar came fourth and fifth with its Devon King’s Oil and Mamador Oil.
Country Director, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Jeremie Zoungrana, said the foundation believes that improving nutrition is one of the most effective tools to ensure that Nigeria’s 200 million people live a healthy and productive life.
“This is why we have heavily invested in fortification and nutrition incentives over the years with a growing focus on Nigeria. We have begun to see the impact on our investment in Nigeria, especially the MFI – which has made significant improvement in fortification practices and commitments,” he added.
He explained that MFI is an innovative mechanism developed by TechnoServe to support the food industry in self-regulating, thus improving fortification compliance. He commended participating firms of the MFI initiative.
“You truly serve as a remarkable example of how food processors can effectively come together to advance strategy in an inclusive transparency in uplifting the wellbeing of Nigerians.”
Another recognition was given to Golden Oil Industries and Sunola Foods Limited for emerging winners of the top trend awards for their improvement.
Also, the Dean, Lagos Business School (LBS), Chris Ogbechie, said some companies had embraced the MFI because they believe the approach will provide better outcomes and health for Nigerians. The professor of Strategic Management noted that LBS was glad to have supported the MFI initiative, urging companies to see fortification as value addition and not as an expense.
The President, OTTACCWA, Alexander Isong, decried low involvement of Nigeria in the cold chain industry, adding that cold chain is an integral part of any economy.
He emphasised the need to shore up the growth of cold-chain logistics, a move that will help meet surging public demand for quality agricultural produce, frozen foods.
The food industry faces a lot of challenges, including the lack of large-scale logistics hubs .