Community's role stressed to tackle issue of malnutrition.

MINGORA -- Nutrition experts here on Wednesday urged the communities and relevant government departments to focus on balanced and nutritious diet for women and children for better future of the country.

They were speaking at the concluding ceremony of a project on sustainable solution to food and nutrition insecurity in KP phase-III, which was implemented by an NGO Lasoona and sponsored by Welthungerhilfe.

Commissioner, Malakand division, Riaz Khan Mehsud was chief guest on the occasion. Nutrition experts, civil society members, students and officials from education, agriculture and livestock departments attended the event.

The speakers said that malnutrition was an alarming issue in the world where 821 million children were malnourished.

'In Pakistan, every four of 10 children are stunted, which makes 40 per cent of the total children,' said Lasoona executive director Azam Khan. He said that malnutrition could be minimised if the community in collaboration with the relevant departments worked collectively for the cause.

Project manager Noor Malik said that the project was aimed at improving food and nutrition security status of the vulnerable communities through integrated approach linking agriculture, food and environment...