Mai Mahmoud - IFPRI Egypt
In support of the strategic goals of the "100 Million Health" initiative, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) held the second seminar in a series of seminars co-organized with the National Nutrition Committee (affiliated by the Academy for Scientific Research and Technology). The IFPRI Egypt seminar, "Research to support the 100 Million Healthy Lives Initiative: Food availability, access and consumption patterns in Egypt", took place at the National Nutrition Institute (NNI) on March 24, 2019.
The aim of the event was to bring together experts and researchers to answer vital questions on food availability, food consumption and possible interventions for improving access to healthy food in Egypt. The importance of establishing a specialized nutrition committee such as the NNC was highlighted by Shafika Nasser, professor of public health at Cairo University. Nasser also explained the comprehensive definition of food security, which embraces aspects of food availability and affordability as well as nutrition and health awareness.
Reham Ghalab, director of the national campaign for the detection of noncommunicable diseases, elucidated how the "100 Million Health" campaign has become a model that other countries in Africa, the Middle East and Europe are seeking to replicate. Up-to-date results of the campaign show that more than 44 million Egyptians have been screened so far. Of those screened about 18 million are found to be obese, 10 million are hypertensive and around 2 million are diabetic. Consequently, the screening campaign was accompanied by awareness and treatment campaigns. The plan of the Ministry of Health and Population is to proceed with the awareness campaign for 4 years, and then follow-up with another screening campaign to evaluate the impact of raising awareness on health outcomes.
Nehal Farouk from the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) presented the evolution of food consumption patterns based on the latest data from the household income, expenditure and consumption survey (HIECS). The last three rounds of HIECS show that the share of food consumption in total annual expenditures has slightly decreased between 2010 to 2015, falling from 40% to 34% respectively. Rural areas in Lower Egypt have consistently had the highest share of total expenditures spent on food; ranging from 48% in 2010 to 40% in 2015.
Further data on food consumption were presented by Afaf Abdel Fattah, Director of the National Nutrition Institute, who showcased results from the Egyptian food consumption survey (2015/ 2016). The survey results present evidence of overconsumption of sodium (salt), fats, and proteins; and underconsumption of iron, calcium, vitamins, and fibers. Hence, the main recommendations based on these results are to raise awareness of healthy diets, reduce the amount of salt in bread (especially subsidized baladi bread), and fortify baladi bread with micronutrients.
The determinants of household access to nutritious food were discussed by Sikandra Kurdi, Associate Research Fellow at IFPRI. Kurdi focused on two main factors which determine household food access: household income and relative food prices. In terms of prices, she noted that the former food subsidy system was associated with higher consumption of rice and sugar compared to meat, vegetables, and dairy. In terms of income, cross-sectional data from a nationally representative sample of Egyptian households demonstrate that the number of food groups consumed by households increases with income level, and a recent impact evaluation of Takaful and Karama cash transfer program conducted by IFPRI showed that increasing household income with cash transfers increased consumption of fruits, meats and poultry. She also mentioned consumption from own agricultural production as a possible driver of household food access.
Sameh Awad, Professor at Faculty of Agriculture Alexandria University and member of the National Nutrition Committee, focused on dairy sources of protein in his presentation. Awad compared traditional and recombined technologies of cheese processing and their effect on the amount of protein found in cheese. He showed that traditional technologies that use ghee produce cheese which contains 15% dairy protein, while recombined technologies that rely on vegetable or palm oil produce cheese with only 4 to 5% of protein in its composition. The reason recombined technology is more common nowadays is due to its lower cost.
The seminar concluded with a question and answer session which provoked further discussion of various topics related to food security. Alternative options to iron fortification of bread and the possibility of mixing wheat with quinoa were raised by the audience. Also, the pros and cons of adding iodine to subsidized salt were noted. In conclusion, the audience agreed with the panel on the critical role that civil society can play in raising nutrition awareness. The example of Food Watch NGO in Europe was presented as a success story that can possibly be adapted in Egypt as well as other countries in the region.
