‘Stunting down to 50% in Tharparkar’

Study says factors include poverty, poor access to water, seasonal migration, early marriages

KARACHI:

Every other child in Sindh's Tharparkar district suffers from stunting, according to a study conducted by the Sindh Planning and Development Department.

Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah chaired the launch ceremony of the report titled "Assessment of Stunting in Tharparkar" at his official residence. The report was initiated by the Ombudsman Sindh, is a regional subsidy of the International Ombudsman Institute (IOI).

It found major risk factors associated with malnutrition such as chronic poverty, poor access to water, poor hygiene and sanitation practices, seasonal migration, early marriages, low birth spacing, lack of connectivity of transport and inadequate human resource across the sandy dunes of Thar and the marshy lands of Parkar.

One of the most densely populated deserts in the world, Tharparkar's population was around 1.6 million according to the 2017 census. Around 325,000 of those were children below the age of five.

At the start of the ceremony, the P&D Department gave a presentation about the study and highlighted that the issue of stunting in children under five years old has been a major problem in Pakistan for the last two decades.

It was 41.6 per cent in 2001 and 43.7 per cent in 2011, 40.2 per cent in 2018, and remained globally critical. Sindh's stunting rate was 48.9 per cent as per National Nutrition Survey (NNS) 2011 and 45.5 per cent as per NNS 2018. According to the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) 2018, it increased to 50 per cent.

For Tharparkar, the rate of stunting was 50.67 per cent compared to 63 per cent in MICS 2014.

The district, Sindh's largest, has one of the lowest human development index rating and among the highest infant mortality rates in Pakistan.

While addressing the ceremony, Shah said that his government had taken steps to improve healthcare. He lauded the Ombudsman's office for initiating such studies that identify gaps and aid the government in improving service delivery. He said that the recommendations of the study would be implemented. Efforts would also be taken to increase the outreach of the office of the Ombudsman for providing administrative justice at doorsteps to the masses.

IOI President Chris Field, Ombudsman Principal Assistant Rebecca Poole, Federal Ombudsman President Ejaz Qureshi, Parliamentary Secretary on Health Qasim Soomro, Chief Secretary Sohail Rajput, P&D Chairman Hassan Naqvi. and members of civil Society and others attended the event.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 14^th, 2023.