Kerala has launched a nutrition bar to tackle malnutrition among children. Named ‘Thenamruth’, the nutrition bar was created by the Department of Women and Child Development and Community Science Wing of the Horticulture College Vellanikkara, Thrissur under the Kerala Agricultural University.
‘Kerala has been able to considerably reduce the child and infant mortality rate. But children’s health can be protected, also by taking care of the malnutrition children as well. We have to move ahead further. Malnutrition among children is found even while the infant mortality rate is less,’ Health Minister KK Shailaja was quoted by The News Minute.
‘It’s from food with multiple ingredients that children get nutrition. Hence the government has come out with the nutri bar which would give sufficient nutrition to children,’ she added.
Meant for children between the ages of three and six, the nutrition bar constitutes 12 ingredients and is rich in nutrients like rice, corn, wheat, ragi, soya flour, Bengal gram, groundnut, sesame, jaggery and liquid glucose. A 100-gram bar comes with 439.65 calories, 15.05-gram protein, 13.21 gram of fat content, 5.23-milligram iron content and 238.71-milligram Calcium, reported.
The initiative is a part of the Women and Child Development Department’s Sambushta Keralam (nutrient-rich Kerala) project. Agricultural Minister VS Sunil Kumar has directed the Agricultural University to take steps to market the nutri bar to make it available at shops.
‘So far,1,15,000 nutri bars have been prepared for distribution among 5,532 children across 14 districts of Kerala at a cost of ₹11.59 lakh,’ Kumar said in a Facebook post.
