Impact of Mid-day Meal Scheme

In News

A recent study stated that the Midday meals have a long-lasting impact.

About

• The paper was authored by a researcher from the University of Washington and economists and nutrition experts at the International Food Policy Research Institute. 
• It found that the midday meal scheme was associated with 13-32% of India’s improvement in height-for-age z-scores (HAZ) between 2006 and 2016.

Key Findings

• Stunting reduced:
  • Lower stunting among children with mothers who had access to free school lunches, shows data from 1993-2016.
    • Stunting i.e, low height for age, is caused by long-term insufficient nutrient intake and frequent infections.
    • Stunting generally occurs before age two, and effects are largely irreversible.
  • The prevalence of stunting was significantly lower in areas where the mid scheme was implemented in 2005.
• Inter generational benefits: 
  • Girls who had access to the free lunches provided at government schools, had children with a higher height-to-age ratio than those who did not.
  • More than one in three Indian children are stunted, or too short for their age, which reflects chronic undernutrition. 
  • The fight against stunting has often focussed on boosting nutrition for young children, but nutritionists have long argued that maternal health and well-being is the key to reduce stunting in their offspring. 

Mid Day Meal Scheme

• In 1925, a Mid Day Meal Programme was introduced for disadvantaged children in Madras Municipal Corporation. 
• By the mid 1980s three States viz. Gujarat, Kerala and Tamil Nadu and the UT of Pondicherry had universalized a cooked Mid Day Meal Programme with their own resources for children studying at the primary stage.
• By 1990-91, the number of States implementing the mid day meal programme with their own resources on a universal or a large scale had increased to twelve states.
• The midday meal scheme was officially launched in 1995.
• It is a Centrally sponsored scheme under the Ministry of Education.
• It was mandated to provide children in government schools with a free cooked meal with a minimum energy content of 450 kcal and 12 gm of protein for primary (I-V class) and 700 calories and 20 gm protein for upper primary (VI-VIII class).
• It aims to:
  • avoid classroom hunger
  • increase school enrolment
  • increase school attendance
  • improve socialisation among castes
  • address malnutrition
  • empower women through employment
• The schools procure AGMARK quality items for preparation of midday meals and 3 adult members need to taste the food first.
  • AGMARK is a certification mark employed on agricultural products in India.
  • Set of standards are approved by the Directorate of Marketing and Inspection, an attached Office of the Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare under the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare. 
  • The present AGMARK standards cover quality guidelines for 224 different commodities spanning a variety of pulses, cereals, essential oils, vegetable oils, Fruits and Vegetables and semi-processed products like vermicelli.
• All government and government aided schools, Madarsa and Maqtabs supported under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) are covered under this.

Challenges

• Focus is on reach and not on quantity or quality of food.
• There are many such unreported cases where students who eat this meal have reported dysentery and ill health. So parents and children fearing safety have declined to have food served in these midday meals. 
• Corrupt practices taking place. CAG’s performance audit report of Mid Day meal not only found financial mismanagement by the Education Ministry but it has also discovered states having indulged in diversion of funds to the tune of Rs 123.29 crore meant for the scheme.
• Casteism is still being practiced and setting the wrong example. In some places the upper caste children refuse to eat food cooked by SC/ST women, in some places the Dalit and backward classes students are made to sit separately from the others, other states have reported incidents where food was reportedly thrown at the Dalit students.
• Implementation  is faulty. Proper guidelines are not followed everywhere, be it food menu or caloric intake.

Way Forward

• Interventions to improve maternal height and education must be implemented years before those girls and young women become mothers
• Work through women’s education, fertility, and use of health services to achieve better HAZ scores.

 Source: TH