By Asmau Ahmad
Nigeria’s Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo has set up an ad-hoc Technical Advisory Group to support the implementation of the 5-year National Multi Sectoral Plan of Action on Nutrition (NMPAN).
In a statement issued by his spokesman, Laolu Akande, he said that the vice president constituted the group at a virtual meeting of the National Committee on Food and Nutrition.
The NMPAN is part of Federal Government’s efforts to address the problems of hunger and malnutrition in the country, membership of the advisory group is drawn from the Office of the Vice President, Nigerian Governors Forum and Nutrition Society of Nigeria.
Others are the Nutrition Partners Forum, Organised Private sector, Academia/ Research, Scaling Up Nutrition Secretariat at the Federal Ministry of Health (FMOH), Civil Society groups-and the UN-Nutrition.
“The technical advisory group will provide high-level strategic advice and support to the Secretariat of the National Council on Nutrition (NCN) on the National Policy on Food and Nutrition’s vision and strategy, thereby facilitating nutrition positioning and comparative advantage to enable maximum impact.
“For the next few months, this group composed of select members of the NCN who are heads of major MDAs and agencies will have the mandates of providing technical assistance to the NCN and Secretariat and facilitate inter and intra-agency coordination, supervision and monitoring, and implementation of the NMPAN.’’
Prof. Osinbajo said that the assignment would be executed by developing a synthesized work plan for the NMPAN and identifying and documenting the roles of each sector and MDA.
According to him, the group will work with the newly constituted National Committee on Food and Nutrition to define and train the secretariat on the capacity needs for the development.
“We need more than ever to think holistically if we are to solve the issues of malnutrition.
“In my opinion, we have embarked on a new era where collaboration and active engagement of stakeholders to assist with implementing the NMPAN is embedded in our agenda and should propel us forward,” he said.
The National Council on Food and Nutrition chaired by the vice president, at its last meeting, approved the action plan titled the NMPFAN 2021-2025– with a target of addressing nutrition and related problems across the country.
