The West Africa Health Organisation (WAHO) has called on member states to finance nutrition to attain Sustainable Development Goal 2 by 2030 in the region.
Dr Melchior Athanase, Director General WAHO, said this in Abuja at the 17th ECOWAS Nutrition Forum (ENF) with the theme: “Leveraging Sustainable Financing for Multisectoral Approaches: Accelerate Universal Access to Nutritious, Safe, Affordable and Sustainable Diets”.
The ECOWAS Nutrition Forum is a regional platform that brings together the major stakeholders in nutrition to review policies, practices and progress in the reduction of malnutrition and diet-related diseases in the sub-region.
Dr Athanase said that the 2030 agenda of SDGs obliged the region to make more effort for the financing of nutrition, which must be one of the indisputable priorities of all member states.
“This is what justifies the choice of the theme of this Forum: “Leveraging sustainable financing for multi-sectoral approaches: accelerating universal access to nutritious, safe, affordable and sustainable diets,” he said.
Dr Athanase further added that, indeed, the present framework of exchanges that the forum offers the region would allow it to free the genius creators for relevant analyzes in the depths of the limits of good nutrition, which would be in perfect harmony with the pragmatic proposals expected, on innovative and original financing mechanisms.
“This theme will therefore be an opportunity to examine the practices of collaborations with innovative and functional multi-sector approaches; this will ultimately lead to a synergy of action for lasting effects that should lead to a significant impact on the financing of nutritional interventions,” he said.
“We will also need a strong coordination of orientation and prioritization of investments for food and nutritional security with equity and justice towards our populations for the establishment of a real ECOWAS of the peoples,” he said.
He said that, Indeed, the right to adequate nutrition is one of the human rights recognized by the UN, which ECOWAS respects in this fight against malnutrition in all its forms.
About 250 nutrition experts from across the ECOWAS region are participating in the meeting. The main objective of the meeting is to strengthen multi-sectoral collaboration to improve financing and Universal Health Coverage (UHC) for nutrition.
The forum will be is an opportunity to examine innovative multisectoral collaboration practices that work best in terms of the synergy of action and sustainable financing of nutrition interventions.