SecureNutrition Spotlight
August 2013
SecureNutrition Spotlight
We are pleased to share a new series of highlights from the Food Security, Agriculture and Nutrition community. In this Spotlight, we focus on the critical role that civil society has in scaling up nutrition, and particularly in ensuring that agricultural systems play their role. The Inaugural Meeting of the Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network took place in Washington DC on June 11. Civil society, whose independence facilitates reaching out to other sectors, including agriculture, and encouraging them to boost nutrition, is a critical part of the SUN movement. This spotlight highlights some of the key actions already being taken from civil society as part of efforts to scale up nutrition.
Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Civil Society Network - a force for Boosting Nutrition through Agriculture

 

Brandon Cox, Chair of SUN CSO Network

 For me, as for many others in the nutrition community, the last few months have been an extremely important, impressive, and exciting time. Things that would have been completely unthinkable just two years ago, from  pledges of over $23billion for nutrition-specific and -sensitive interventions , to  41 countries now signed up to being part of the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) movement have become reality.

 

The advances of the last couple of years represent a hugely positive shift whose impacts will be felt for years to come, and the estimated 20 million children who will be saved from stunting as a result of the Nutrition for Growth summit is just one measure of our community's recent successes.

 

But we also know that the scale of the problem remains large -malnutrition is a death sentence for over 3 million children every year and a life sentence for millions more, crushing their life-long ability to learn and to earn and costing the global economy as much as  $125billion per year.

 

That's why one of the most exciting moments of the past few months for me was the Inaugural Meeting  of the Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network which took place in Washington DC on June 11. The meeting counted over 66 representatives from civil society in over 32 countries from across the SUN movement. Participants agreed on priorities for how civil society around the world will work together to ensure our recent successes continue to increase and to meet the challenge that remains. We agreed to a declaration setting out what we will focus on, what we demand of others, and how we will make it happen. We must now ensure recent advocacy successes are followed through ensuring commitments are met and goals achieved. The Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network is a key player in making this happen.

 

Mother and child in Nepal

As well as making impressive gains last month, we also learned a lot. The new Lancet series on nutrition highlighted once again the importance of nutrition-sensitive interventions, including agricultural programmes, as well as giving us key insights as to ways to improve their nutritional impact. The outcomes from Nutrition for Growth highlighted, once again, that governments and donors still need to clarify and unify their approaches to nutrition-sensitive actions. And finally, for me, at the Inaugural Meeting, I heard voices around the table again and again talking not only about the untapped potential of agriculture presenting a real opportunity for further gains to be made against malnutrition, but also about how civil society is already working to reach out to farmers groups and influence agriculture in order to boost balanced and sustainable nutrition.

 

This SecureNutrition spotlight highlights some of the key actions already being taken from civil society as part of efforts to scale up nutrition. It highlights how, of all parts of the SUN movement, it is civil society whose fluidity and independence allows us to do the essential job of reaching out to other sectors, including agriculture, encouraging them to boost nutrition. The Zambian Civil Society Network's work is a good example of this at the national level, while internationally, the Asian Farmer's Association (AFA) show how they are actively involved in influencing regional Asian processes to boost nutrition through agriculture.

 

Growing Broccoli

As chair of the Network, I see three particular opportunities for civil society involved in Scaling Up Nutrition to have impact in the area of nutrition-agriculture linkages. Most immediately this year's CFS-40, where there is already talk of a civil society side event focusing on a rights-based approach to nutrition in food systems. Then next year the African Union will focus on African agricultural programmes, including CAADP, as part of its "year of agriculture", and influencing reform of these to better highlight nutrition is of course a key opportunity. In the longer term, the post 2015 process of course presents an opportunity to increase the nutritional impact, equity, sustainability and resilience of food systems. The SUN civil society network will be working to influence all of these processes.

 

Civil society's involvement in the SUN movement has already been incredibly impressive, and I am excited to see how we further strengthen recent gains in nutrition and reach to include others from across the movement. I hope that this SecureNutrition spotlight sparks yet more ideas, inspiration and energy, of the type which has helped us to get so far already in impacting malnutrition.

Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network  
The Scaling Up Nutrition Civil Society Network is made up of national and international organizations working in various areas including: farmers, fisherfolk, human rights defenders, women's groups, humanitarian and aid assistance agencies, research entities, consumer groups, trade unions and many others. The primary purpose of the Network is to align the strategies, efforts and resources of civil society with country plans for scaling up nutrition within the SUN Framework. Organizations within the Network work together to build capacity and maximize resources to ensure the greatest impact on nutrition. The Network currently represents the collaboration of over 200 organizations with local or international presence. For more information visit the SUN CSO website
Mainstreaming nutrition in African agriculture: development discourse, opportunities and challenges


Buba Khan, Africa Policy Officer for ActionAid International and member of the SUN CSN, writes about the challenges in linking agriculture and nutrition, and the role civil society can play in overcoming them.
 
Reform existing programmes to increase their effect on nutrition: A key Ask from Zambia CSO-SUN Alliance to the government


William Chilufya, Coordinator of the CSO-SUN Zambia, writes about the work of the Alliance of Civil Society Organisations for Scaling Up Nutrition (CSO-SUN) in Zambia to raise and create demand for improved nutrition among the Zambia population, and to advocate for a policy that supports diversification of the agriculture.

 Read the blog
Lawrence Haddad: Civil Society - the need to do more to make nutrition more visible

Lawrence Haddad writes about the Civil Society Network of the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) and its inaugural Meeting that held on June 11, in Washington, DC.

 

Read the blog.

The AFA asserts women farmers' representation in nutrition and food security mechanisms and processes
The Asian Farmers Association for Sustainable Rural Development (AFA) writes about their work influencing regional agricultural processes to make them more rights- and nutrition-focused.

Read more about this initiative
Declaration of Commitment
The Network meeting in Washington DC resulted in a declaration reaffirming civil society's commitment to support national efforts to scale up nutrition. View the final declaration (English | French | Spanish)
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