Zambia food business wants positive nutrition logo

August 9th, 2016

The Scaling Up Nutrition Business Network Zambia (SBN) has decided to implement a positive front-of-pack logo to guide the Zambian consumers to a nutritious choice. While in Zambia 42% of the children under 5 are still stunted, overweight and NCDs are on the rise.

SBN Zambia invited Choices to share its experience with criteria development and the implementation of a front-of-pack logo, in a workshop at 3-4 August in Lusaka. During the workshop, that was attended by experts from government, food industry, nutrition science and the World Food Programme, the participants concluded to take the Choices principles and the Choices International criteria as starting point for their logo development.

To address the double burden of poverty, also a link with malnutrition should be taken into account. By this decision, both SBN Zambia and the World Food Programme show their preparedness to shift from a focus on undernutrition to malnutrition: the imbalance of nutrient intake can have different manifestations, even within the same person in time. Addressing these manifestations of malnutrition demands new concepts and models. Choices International is ready to contribute to this re-thinking, in which target audience are not defined as beneficiaries that need help, but as consumers who have a choice. This also might be a healthier choice.

What is SBN

The Scaling Up Nutrition Business Network Zambia (SBN) is a group of national and international companies that aims at improving the supply of nutritious food in Zambia. It is part of the international SUN movement in 42 countries, supported by GAIN and WFP. See www.sunbusinessnetwork.org.