POSHAN Abhiyaan

POSHAN Abhiyaan (erstwhile National Nutrition Mission) was launched in March 2018 to achieve improvement in nutritional status of Children from 0-6 years, Adolescent Girls, Pregnant Women and Lactating Mothers in a time bound manner and to achieve reduction in stunting and wasting in children (0-6 years) as well as reduction in anemia in women, children and adolescent girls. The Abhiyaan has been rolled out in all the 36 States/UTs including the state of Tamil Nadu and Odisha. The key components of the Scheme include use of technology, convergence and behaviour change communication through Jan Andolan. Another key plank of the Abhiyaan to enable the right kind of nourishment are the PoshanVatikas or Nutri-gardens that are being set up across the country to provide easy and affordable access to fruits, vegetables, medicinal plants and herbs.

PoshanAbhiyan has now been re-aligned as part of Mission Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0, along with Anganwadi services and revised Scheme for adolescent Girls. It seeks to strengthen nutritional content, delivery, outreach and outcomes with focus on developing practices that nurture health, wellness and immunity to disease and malnutrition. It rests on the key pillars of Maternal Nutrition, Infant and Young Child Feeding Norms, Treatment of SAM/MAM and wellness through AYUSH. Under Poshan 2.0, focus is on diet diversity, food fortification, leveraging traditional systems of knowledge and popularizing use of millets. Nutrition awareness strategies under Poshan 2.0 aim to develop sustainable health and well-being through regional meal plans to bridge dietary gaps. 

Further, greater emphasis is being given on the use of millets for preparation of Hot Cooked Meal and Take Home rations (not raw ration) at Anganwadi centres for Pregnant Women, Lactating Mothers and Children below 6 years of age, as millets have high nutrient content which includes protein, essential fatty acid, dietary fibre, B-Vitamins, minerals such as calcium, iron, zinc, folic acid and other micro-nutrients thus helping to tackle anemia and other micro-nutrient deficiencies in women and children. Further, under Mission Poshan 2.0, only fortified rice is being allocated to States/UTs. Steps have been taken to improve nutritional quality and testing in accredited labs, strengthen delivery and leverage technology under the ‘Poshan Tracker’, a robust ICT enabled platform to improve governance with regard to real time monitoring of provisioning of supplementary nutrition for prompt supervision and management of services.

PoshanAbhiyan is a Centrally Sponsored Scheme with the implementation of the scheme being done by States/UTs. To ensure that all Anganwadi Centres are equipped with Smart phones and Growth Monitoring devices (GMDs) such as Infantometer, Stadiometer, Weighing Scale for Mother and Infant, the Ministry has released revised guidelines for technical specifications and replacement of GMDs by the States.

1. Under PoshanAbhiyan, training is conducted for field functionaries’ upto the level of Anganwadi Workers. More than 10 lakh Anganwadi Workers have been trained on thematic modules to strengthen the implementation and operationalisation of the Abhiyaan.
2. The Abhiyaan has been rolled out in all the Districts of Tamil Nadu and Odisha, including remote and backward areas. The details of the coverage of the scheme, total beneficiaries registered on the Poshan Tracker application are given in the table below:

4. So far, an amount of Rs.540295.40lakh has been released to States/UTs under the Abhiyaan. Regular reports are received from States regarding progress of fund utilization under POSHAN Abhiyaan. Delays if any, are monitored through sustained engagements with State Governments in review meetings to ensure that targets are achieved and funds are utilized. A major plank of PoshanAbhiyan is Behaviour Change Communication through Jan Andolan activities. Due to Covid pandemic, States/ UTs were unable to fully utilise funds as the Jan Andolan activities were affected. States/UTs are advised to utilise the funds allocated under various components of POSHAN Abhiyaan as per the cost norms for effective implementation of the scheme.

5. The estimated number of underweight, malnourished and severely malnourished children under 5 years of age is obtained under National Family Health Survey (NFHS) conducted by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare. As per the recent report of NFHS-5 (2019-21), the nutrition indicators for children under 5 years have improved as compared with NFHS-4 (2015-16). Wasting has improved from 21% (NFHS-4) to 19.3 % (NFHS-5), Under nutrition has improved from 35.7% (NFHS-4) to 32.1% (NFHS-5) and stunting has improved from 38.4%(NFHS-4) to 35.5% (NFHS-5).

55. Monitoring & Evaluation Office (DMEO) under NITI Aayog has conducted Sectoral Evaluation of schemes including POSHAN Abhiyaan. Performance of PoshanAbhiyan has been found ‘Satisfactory’ in the categories of Relevance, Sustainability and Equity.

Further, in order to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the Abhiyaan, Mission SakshamAnganwadi and Poshan 2.0, the integrated nutrition support programme was announced in budget 2021-2022 for all States/UTs. Steps have been taken to improve nutritional quality and testing in accredited labs, strengthen delivery and leverage technology under Poshan Tracker to improve governance. Streamlined Guidelines were issued for transparency and accountability in delivery of supplementary nutrition and to track nutritional outcomes on 13.01.2021. This information was given by the Union Minister of Minority Affairs, Smt. Smriti Zubin Irani, in a written reply in Lok Sabha today.