Vice President Launches POSHAN Anthem

News: Vice President of India, M. Venkaiah Naidu launched the POSHAN Anthem.

Facts:

About POSHAN Anthem:

• The aim of the POSHAN Anthem is to inspire people to join the movement to fight malnutrition in India.

About POSHAN Abhiyan

• The Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nutrition or POSHAN Abhiyan or National Nutrition Mission was launched in 2018. It is implemented by the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
• Goal: To achieve improvement in nutritional status of Children (0-6 years) and Pregnant Women and Lactating Mothers (PW&LM) in a time-bound manner and ensure attainment of malnutrition free India by 2022
• Targets:  To reduce stunting, under-nutrition, anaemia (among young children, women and adolescent girls) and reduce low birth weight by 2%, 2%, 3% and 2% per annum respectively. Although the target to reduce Stunting is at least 2% p.a., it strives to achieve a reduction in Stunting from 38.4% (NFHS-4) to 25% by 2022.
• For the implementation of POSHAN Abhiyan the four-point strategy/pillars of the mission are:

o   Inter-sectorial convergence for better service delivery. This includes the convergence of nutrition-related schemes of various Ministries and Departments

o   Use of technology (ICT) for real-time growth monitoring and tracking of women and children: ICDS-Common Application Software has been developed under POSHAN Abhiyaan. It facilitates the capture of data by frontline functionaries (Anganwadi Workers and Lady Supervisors) and helps in monitoring interventions.

o   Intensified health and nutrition services for the first 1000 days

o   Jan Andolan ie. public participation. The launch of POOSHAN anthem is a part of the Jan Andolan

Note: Stunting- low height for age, Wasting- low weight compared to height, Underweight- low weight for age. Malnutrition includes both under and over nutrition.