The webinar on ’Food Fortification to Combat Malnutrition’ supported by NETPROFAN & Eat Right India
HADSA – IDA Mumbai Chapter recently organised a webinar on ’Food Fortification to Combat Malnutrition’ supported by NETPROFAN & Eat Right India.
Dr Zamrudd Patel, Convenor – IDA Mumbai Chapter opened the webinar by welcoming the audience and esteemed speakers on behalf of the IDA Mumbai Chapter giving a brief about its activities.
Dr Vaibhav Kulkarni, Board Member – HADSA stated that measures to correct micronutrient deficiencies aim at ensuring the consumption of a balanced diet that is adequate in every nutrient. Food fortification has the dual advantage of being able to deliver nutrients to large segments of the population without requiring radical changes in food consumption patterns. Food fortification became commonplace during the first and second World Wars to help prevent nutritional deficiencies within the population and to replace nutrients that were lost during food processing.
He further stated that fortified foods help to fill in the nutritional gaps in our diet. They can deliver vitamins and minerals to large portions of the population without requiring large changes in our behaviour or diet.
Deepti Gulati, Ex-Lead GAIN, Nutrition & Public Health Professional in her Special Address in detail touched upon the need for strengthening the need for food fortification with a few case studies.
Vivek Arora, Principal Lead – FFRC – FSSAI shared the FFRC-FSSAI initiative on Food Fortification.
The panel discussion on ’Food Fortification – Milestones and Way Forward’ was moderated by Deepti Gulati, Ex-Lead GAIN, Nutrition & Public Health Professional with panellists viz. Rohini Saran, Project Lead – Nutrition, PATH; Vivek Arora, Principal Lead – FFRC, FSSAI and Dr Venna Yardi, Former Associate Professor, Nirmala Niketan College of Home Science sharing their views citing examples.
Dr Jayshree Paranjape, Co-Convenor, IDA Mumbai Chapter and Kaushik Desai, Secretary-General, HADSA summarised the proceedings of the Webinar and proposed the vote of thanks.
The webinar had 319 participants.