The Making Nutrition Aspirational for Children and Women programme is a $10 million partnership between The Power of Nutrition, UNICEF and the Government of Maharashtra. The programme aims to strengthen the implementation capacity and delivery of essential nutrition services at both state and district levels, in line with POSHAN Abhiyaan (the Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment). Whilst the programme has state wide influence, it also has an initial focus on five districts exhibiting a high burden of stunting: Nandurbar, Gadchiroli, Osamanabad, Washim, Palghar and the Municipal Corporations of Bhiwandi and Malegoan.
The programme has five core foci, aligning to POSHAN Abhiyaan targets:
This partnership between The Government of Maharashtra, UNICEF and The Power of Nutrition focuses on improved access and utilisation of essential nutrition interventions: iron and folic acid supplementation for pregnant women, vitamin A and deworming, nutrition education, counselling to improve feeding, and care of children with severe acute malnutrition. These will be complemented with interventions to improve hygiene and sanitation. This investment will bring about more effective and efficient services to the most vulnerable populations in Maharashtra.
Following coverage scale-up assumptions, over 2020-2024 the investment will avert around 217,000 cases of stunting, 7,000 deaths of under-5s and 272,000 maternal anaemia cases.
Success of the programme will be measured based on improvements in the nutritional status of women and children relative to current anaemia, stunting, and wasting levels identified in the baseline data (NFHS-4) and other relevant datasets.
This programme has reached 2,031,861 women, 1,203,176 adolescents, and 6,589,888 children with health and nutrition interventions.
Programme Partners: UNICEF, Government of Maharashtra (India)
The Power of Nutrition Donors: The Power of Nutrition Platform Funding