In November, Medicins Sans Frontiers (MSF) published the report “Malnutrition: How much is being spent?” which analyzes nutrition funding flows from 2004-2007. The report investigates the amount of aid that is being spent on nutrition yearly, comparing that number with the amount that is needed to make real, significant strides against childhood malnutrition as outlined by the Millennium Development Goals. The report revealed that in many ways, funding and the way that funds are being used, is falling short.

Last year the Lancet estimated that the “total donor investment in basic nutrition in low-income and middle-income countries probably did not exceed US $250-300 million a year for the period 2000-2004.” This year in their report, based on data collected from the OECD, ECHO, the World Bank and other sources, MSF estimates international funding of nutrition programs to be approximately $350 million for the period 2004-2007. At first glance, the estimate appears to reveal a modest rise of $50 million in funding since the Lancet’s report.  However, MSF found that recent trends should have led to a greater increase. “Malnutrition should in recent years have benefited both from the global renewed interest in the problem, [inspired largely by the surge in food prices, bringing home the urgency of the problem], and from the emergence of a broad consensus within the nutrition community enabling the scale up of activities in high-burden countries.” Yet MSF’s analysis finds that funding has remained more or less flat since the period of 2000-2004.

The amount that is yearly being dedicated to malnutrition is not only stagnant, it also falls drastically short of the amount needed to effectively address malnutrition. The World Bank’s most recent estimate says that $12.5 billion yearly is necessary “ to enable the scale up of the nutrition package in the 36 high burden countries and the 32 small countries with high prevalence rates.”* This means that current yearly funding is 30 times less than the amount needed to fight malnutrition.

The report goes on to call for agreement between relevant actors on which interventions should be delivered at the country level and how to scale up prioritized interventions. “Such an agreement would ensure a better allocation of funding resources and guide both donors and recipient countries in determining policy.” The report also suggests a change in food aid policies, from limiting in-kind donations to providing cash to finance food aid interventions, and also calls for improvements in collection and reporting in both funding and implementation systems.

As the report points out, funding dedicated to nutrition will need to be increased considerably if malnutrition is to be overcome. The $12.5 billion that the World Bank identified as necessary to address malnutrition could come in part from existing government budgets, but the funding gap will have to be filled primarily by public sources, be it through domestic programs or international aid. “This will require political commitment from donors, recipient countries and international organisations.”

*The cost estimation provided by the World Bank is based on a set of 13 interventions supported by the latest scientific evidence and identified as necessary for 36 high-burden countries. The interventions were classified in the following three categories: Complementary and therapeutic feeding interventions (accounting for $6.2 billion in funding), micronutrients and de-worming ($1.5B), and behavior change interventions ($2.9B). $1.5 billion is needed for capacity and research and $0.7 billion accounts for the 32 countries other countries with high prevalence rates. 

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