Study: Nutrition-sensitive agriculture

The study provided an overview of the cross-cutting themes relevant to nutrition-sensitive agriculture (conceptual discussion, plant breeding, gender, production and processing, home and community gardens, urban agriculture and market integration) and presented examples from eight countries: Bangladesh, Brazil, Cambodia, Egypt, Malawi, Mongolia, the Philippines and South Africa. Despite the fact that nutrition-sensitive agriculture as a system is just emerging and therefore has not been integrated as such in the agricultural and nutrition concepts and strategies of most countries, the examples derived from a wide range of very different countries and cross-cutting topics do reveal a variety of possibilities and opportunities for incorporating nutrition objectives into agriculture and food systems. They also show how agricultural and related food security policies and interventions can be de- signed and implemented in a manner contributing to an adequate, well-balanced diet of the population.

The study was financially supported by the Sector project "Agricultural Policy and Food Security" (PN 81150110) of Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH. It was carried out from October 2012 until March 2013. It was made possible by an international collaboration involving numerous experts from Africa, Asia, Latin America and Germany.