-Press release by the Right to Food Campaign Secretariat dated February 23, 2022 * 66 percent respondents said that their income has decreased compared to the pre-pandemic period * 80 percent reported some form of food insecurity, 25 percent reported severe food insecurity * 41 percent said that nutritional quality of their diet deteriorated compared to the pre-pandemic period * 67 percent could not afford cooking gas in the month preceding the survey. * 45...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Jean Drèze, development economist and right to food activist, interviewed by Shriya Mohan (The Hindu Business Line)
-The Hindu Business Line The development economist, now part of Tamil Nadu’s Economic Advisory Council, says that public expenditure on health is just 0.6 per cent of the state domestic product, one of the lowest ratios among Indian states * Universal quality education, health care and social security are still distant goals * A well-designed system of emergency cash transfers would be quite useful in this situation of recurrent crises, which may last...
More »India’s nutrition crisis has widened during the pandemic – especially for women and children -Deepanshu Mohan, Vanshika Shah and Advaita Singh
-Scroll.in The focus is on providing food grains to the very poor as against supporting that with more funding for existing nutrition-focussed welfare programmes. Data collated from a recent paper -studying the impact of the Covid-19 lockdown in 2020 by Jean Dreze and Anmol Somanchi reflect the grim condition of India’s looming malnutrition crisis. In a co-authored essay around April 2020, we had argued how the “hidden costs of this pandemic” (and the...
More »Rural health care needs fixing, and now -Bhupinder Singh Hooda
-The Hindu A takeaway from the pandemic is that India needs to revisit and refurbish its health infrastructure in the rural areas The two consecutive waves of COVID-19 and Mucormycosis have left us shattered. Multiple bruises have been caused to us. But during the second wave of the pandemic, it is our rural people who are struggling the most. They are struggling to get prompt and quality health care. The key role...
More »Centre announces Rs 100 per child under mid-day meal, gets flak from health and nutrition experts -Shivani Gupta
-GaonConnection.com The central government has recently announced Rs 100 per child under the mid-day meal scheme to meet the nutritional needs of children in the pandemic. But, activists say this amount is insufficient and there is a need to resume cooked meal services universally with better quality. The central government has announced Rs 1,200 crore [Rs 12,000 million] to be given to 118 million children across the country who are enrolled under...
More »