National Food and Nutrition Policy.

The Goal of the present Policy is to improve the health and nutritional well-being of the total population through the consumption of nutrition foods. The Sub-goals and Targets are, inter alia to reduce the prevalence of sores, scabies and skin and eye infection of the general population; to reduce the incidence of an anaemia; to improve the dental health; maintain the current good nutritional status of babies, infants and school children with respect to growth and development.To reach these sub-goals there must be a steady supply of nutritious food which people do consume. For nutritious food to be accessible, it must first be produced and supplied (i.e. available) and affordable. Furthermore, people shall be educated to know which foods are nutritious. The food security and consumption patterns and nutritional status of the population must be assessed annually to determine the effectiveness of the Policy.
The Objectives are defined as follows: Objective 1 is to increase the availability of nutritious food. The responsibility of the Department of Agriculture is to encourage food production at a national and household level. Agriculture should be specific on what crops to grow, where, how and for what purpose. It should also provide technical advice to farmers on: mixed cropping and agro-forestry; the use of poultry and pig manure to improve soil fertility; effective pest and disease control; continue to enforce quarantine regulations, including insisting that all planting materials and seeds should only be imported via the Department of Agriculture. There are also some specific activities such as home gardening of nutritious and easily-grown fruit, green leafy vegetables and other vegetables providing small tools to keen farmers; farmers should be encouraged to gradually remove older, non –productive beadfruit and coconut trees and re-plant with a range of varieties. As far as livestock is concerned the Department should assist interested farmers on the outer islands in procuring ducks and provide advice inter rearing as they are not very demanding of labour and the survival rate of ducklings is quite high. Also pigs/poultry should be encouraged as their manure are good source for compost. The Department of Fisheries should increasingly exploit Tuvalu’s cheap and most abundant fish resource for household consumption by i) using data from USAID project to increase the exploitation of the deep-slope marine resource; ii) encouraging the speeding-up of the Austrialian funded project in the Rural Development sector that aims to develop a community fishing centre on each island; iii) taking advantage of assistance from the Japanese to improve the supply of fish through providing technical training in commercial fishing, fish handling and equipment maintenance, and extending this expertise to interest fishermen; measure to protect the fish and marine life may need to be taken. Food distribution in the community shall be improved by the Department of Commerce.
Objective 2: increase the accessibility of nutritious food. Objective 3: To increase the desire to consume nutritious food. First of all the level of nutritional awareness in the general public shall be increased; the nutritional knowledge shall be improved amongst the general public of the food needs of pregnant and lactating women. Objective 4: To improve the intra-household food distribution. Good nutritional and child care practices in the Tuvaluau parents and families shall be promoted; Objective 5: To improve lifestyle factors, environmental and personal hygiene; Objective 6: To improve the health services for «at risk»groups; Objective 7: To evaluate the policy implementation and monitor the food and nutrition situation. The implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the Food and Nutriton Policy shall be coordinated; the nation’s food security and consumption patterns shall be monitored; the nutritional status of the population shall be improved.