The Democratic Republic of Congo has the highest rate of malnutrition in central and West Africa, affecting 43% of children under five, says Unicef on Tuesday.
Marianne Flach, the representative of the UN children’s agency in Congo, said at the opening of a regional workshop on reducing malnutrition that in central Africa, some countries have a rate of chronic malnutrition which is still alarming. About 75 experts from various countries in central Africa came to take part in the workshop, which will continue until Thursday in a northern community of Brazzaville.
The DR Congo, affected by successive wars, is followed by the Central African Republic (40.7%) and Cameroon (32.5%), Flach said, suffer from this condition. She also added that the Congo Republic had 175 000 young children suffering from chronic malnutrition, or a rate of 24.4%. These countries are also amongst 11 countries categorized in the extreme risk with food insecurity. Report says even though a food crisis has not surfaced yet, there is possibility for food-related disruption across the most susceptible regions of the world, African.
Chronic malnutrition is a plague that affects several countries in the world and in Africa. It is the underlying cause of 35% of deaths in the world and can appear in different forms. Flach called for a “co-ordinate multi-sector response” to eradicate the problem. According to Unicef, chronic malnutrition shows itself in children by a delayed growth rate, which has a very negative impact on the health of the child, because he or she runs a higher risk of being infected by chronic non-infectious diseases.
It has also been anticipated by the World Bank that 19 million people are in danger of hunger and malnutrition in Africa. According to them, too often borders get in the way of receiving food to homes and communities who have too little to eat . The situation can only be avoided if large swathes of uncultivated land are put to productive use and cross-border restrictions removed could also help prevent food crises and malnutrition if farmers are simply allowed to trade more with each other and get food to communities facing shortages.