Leaf Vegetables from “Pocket Gardens” Succeed in Preventing Anemias in Mothers in Tanzania

Leaf Vegetables from “Pocket Gardens” Succeed in Preventing Anemias in Mothers in Tanzania

Breeding and consumption of leafy vegetables have been successful in helping mothers in rural Tanzania towards a more micronutrient rich diet. With the consumption of  Chinese cabbage and spinach beets, for example, it was possible to improve the intake of vitamin A and iron, thereby reducing the risk of anemia. The breeding of leafy vegetables took place in so-called “pocket gardens”. This is reported by scientists from the German University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, and the Sokoine University of Agriculture, Tanzania, from the “Scale-N project” (1).

The Scaling-Up Nutrition (Scale-N) project supports a well-balanced diet in sub-Saharan Africa through the nutrition-sensitive1 cultivation of selected plant and vegetable crops in Tanzania. Health data collected from 666 mothers from two villages in the districts of Chamwino and Kilosa in Tanzania document changes in the nutritional status of women.
The multicenter study has been funded by the German Federal Agency for Agriculture and Food (BLE) for a period of three years with a budget of around 1.4 million euros (2).

Nutrition-sensitive agriculture1 focuses on an approach that emphasizes nutritionally valuable foods, nutritional diversity and food fortification to combat malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies (3).

Read more:

(1) W. Stütz et al. Nutritional and micronutrient status in mothers and caregivers in rural areas of Tanzania: Results of the Scale-N baseline survey. V 2-5. Proc. Germ. Nutr. Soc., Vol. 24 (2018), S. 10, available at https://www.dge.de/fileadmin/public/doc/wk/2018/DGE-Proc-Germ-Nutr-Soc-Vol-24-2018.pdf

(2) Scale-N: Scaling-Up Nutrition: Implementing Potentials of nutrition-sensitive and diversified agriculture to increase food security. Website available at  http://www.scale-n.org/

(3) Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Nutrition-sensitive agriculture. Second International Conference on Nutrition. 19-21 November 2014. Available at http://www.fao.org/3/a-as601e.pdf

 

1 Nutrition-sensitive agriculture focuses on an approach that emphasizes nutritionally valuable foods, nutritional diversity and food fortification to combat malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies (3).

Leave a Reply

By continuing to use this site, you agree to the use of cookies. Further Information

We use cookies. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you agree to this. You can delete our cookies. How this works is explained in our privacy policy.

Close