What would the sex of the child above be? How about if I asked you to describe this child?

I bet your best descriptions were; stick-like limbs, head and abdominal areas outgrowing other body parts and most certainly the chest region almost coming out like wildfire, among a few.

Let me just bail you out, this child is a girl, almost 5 years of age and definitely one out of 539 million children globally suffering from the downside of malnutrition thus undernutrition, specifically wasting, stunting and hidden hunger.

And just because she is from the sub-Sahara African region, is 15 times more likely to die compared to a child from a high-income economy.

Not only will this child forever remain physically retarded, she will also never enjoy that singular honour of attaining her full cognitive potential, heart-breaking right? What’s more, around 45%, that is 2.4 million deaths, among children under 5 years of age are linked to undernutrition, a characteristic this poor girl shares. Mostly occurring in low and middle- income countries of which Ghana is a part of.

Beyond health, slow progress in malnutrition is also impacting the social and economic development of countries, with undernutrition in all its forms alone causing a society a whopping estimated US$3 trillion loss per year.

Just because we may not have encountered a child like this doesn’t mean they do not exist. Besides it is the fundamental right of every child to grow to their maximum potential, a responsibility all humans must embrace.

What does this piece intend to accomplish? It is simple, to make you understand the severity of this long standing problem, and join in on the campaign as a non-spectator citizen, for it is only the power of numbers that can be our greatest ally in putting food and nutrition security higher above any other need, Afterall the father of medicine, Hippocrates said it best; ’’let food be your medicine and medicine be your food’’. And I ask, can food be our medicine when it is not economically, socially and physically available not even to talk about its quality?

This leaves everyone a watch dog;

• From the academia and institutions alike, conducting and bringing out research works it has carried out to eradicate this problem

• From the Government and policy makers, supporting research activities and rolling out favourable and workable policies,
• And most importantly from the ordinary citizen through the media expressing genuine concern and support for this ideal.

It is important to note that it is only through a concerted approach that this cancer can be gotten rid of. Till we all join in on this campaign, speak up, make our opinions heard and get ourselves involved working relentlessly, Food security, a critical subject of national and global interest, will continue to receive an undeserving attention as many other secondary and tertiary problems.

As Murphy puts it, ‘anything that can go wrong, will go wrong’. But the interesting part is, we have in us the capacity to defy this simple but factual logic. Yes, some work is been done, but it is simply not enough.

And if indeed children are the future…. then the gods have a huge serving on their plate!!!

Until we realize food is the only true enemy.

Rexford Obeng
Department of Nutrition and Food Science
University of Ghana