Posted on April, 6, 2022 at 08:16 am
At least 70 per cent of maize flour in Kenya is now fortified with three of the mandated micronutrients, a new survey shows.
This is an improvement from the 51 per cent compliance level in 2018.
Similarly, fortification levels for wheat flour jumped from 28 per cent in 2018 to 49 per cent.
The survey looked at fortification of vitamin A, B3 and iron.
The results are from the Strengthening African Processor of Fortified Foods programme.
The four-year initiative supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, has been helping millers and food processors improve compliance.
In Kenya, fortification of packaged maize and wheat flour was made mandatory through an amendment of the Foods, Drugs and Chemical Substances Act in June 2012.
The mandated micronutrients and vitamins for wheat and maize flour are iron, zinc, vitamins A, B1, B2, B3, B6, B12 and folic acid.
Although malnutrition indicators are improving, it is estimated that from 2010 to 2030, undernutrition will cost Kenya approximately US$38.3 billion in GDP due to losses in workforce productivity.
“Fortifying staple foods like wheat and maize flour with key vitamins and minerals is one of the most scalable, sustainable and cost-effective tools to combat malnutrition in Kenya and worldwide,” Nobert Aluku, the regional monitoring and evaluation manager at TechnoServe said.
TechnoServe is a non-profit that implemented the SAPFF programme.
Kenya National Bureau of Statistics data show out of a total under-five population of seven million, 1.82 million children (26 per cent) are suffering from chronic malnutrition (stunting or low height-for-age).
However, the SAPFF programme shows overall progress, despite some challenges that the milling industry has expressed as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Data gathering has remained a critical component of SAPFF’s engagement strategy with the private sector. It facilitates trust on the basis of product quality assessments.
"It also encourages shared prioritisation and collective action amongst key stakeholders within the national food fortification ecosystem,” Aluku said.
In 2019, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology conducted a study on compliance.
It established that, at that time, nearly half of the maize millers in Kenya did not add essential minerals and vitamins to their flour products.
While all large-scale millers were found to be fortifying, only 46 per cent of medium-scale millers fortified their products.
The situation was worse among small-scale millers where just 24 per cent reported adding the mandatory micronutrients to the flours.
Prof Daniel Sila, who presented the results of the 2019 Jkuat study, identified skills gap, lack of equipment and high cost of premixes, as some of the hurdles by small and medium-scale millers to fortification compliance.
Kenya’s Food Fortification programme manager at the Ministry of Health, John Mwai, however said that anybody who enters the milling industry must be prepared to comply with all regulations.
Source: The Star