The Poor man’s rich grain is getting richer – a new study published in the Journal of Nutrition shows that a variety of new pearl millet (more commonly known as bajra), which was conventionally bred to be 10% richer in iron helped iron-deficient children under the age of 3 years, to absorb enough of this crucial mineral to meet their physiological requirements. (See links below for full text and a...
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Fleeing the light -Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey
-The Hindu Political parties have acted as judge, jury, supplicant and advocate in their move to amend the RTI Act and exempt themselves from its purview. Their rhetoric on transparency is more hollow than ever A friend called the other day, and said: "I want to congratulate all of you in the RTI community, because you have managed to do what no one, and nothing else has managed to for a long...
More »When teachers demanded double the mid-day meal for children on Mondays
-The Hindu Mumbai: On his trip to the Adivasi belt of Thane, teachers who got wind of journalist P. Sainath's (The Hindu's Rural Affairs Editor) visit approached him with a problem. "Could you please ask the government to provide twice the amount of mid-day meal on Monday? After the Friday afternoon meal, our children starve over the weekend. No teacher is willing to teach this bunch of kids whose bellies are...
More »In Gujarat, the PDS is exclusionary & leaky-Rukmini S
-The Hindu Many States have been improving their Public Distribution System over the last five years On Tuesday, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi wrote to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh criticising the National Food Security Bill (NFSB) for not being expansive enough. What Mr. Modi omitted to mention is that the same complaint could be made of the existing Public Distribution System (PDS) in his own state. The most significant difference between the PDS...
More »Are Child Malnutrition Figures for India Exaggerated?-Arun Gupta, Biraj Patnaik, Devika Singh, Dipa Sinha, Radha Holla, R Srivatsan, Sachin Jain, Samir Garg, Sejal Dand, Sulakshana Nandi, Vandana Prasad, and Veena Shatrugna
-Economic and Political Weekly In his paper Arvind Panagariya argues that the current World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended international growth standards exaggerate the extent of stunting in India. He points out that while the prevalence of stunting by current norms is higher in India than many Poorer Sub-Saharan African countries, it has much lower mortality rates than them and a better record of economic growth. He deals his cards deftly, giving...
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