Dr Muyibat Olodo, Director, Technology and Science Education Department, Federal Ministry of Education has urged stakeholders to strengthen school nutrition policies, to combat learning outcomes deficiencies.
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Olodo gave the advice at a Stakeholders’ Planning Meeting in Maraba on Tuesday.
The News Agency Nigeria (NAN) reports that the meeting is on Assessment of the Universal Salt Iodisation (USI) Status of Primary School Learners.
Olodo was represented by Emmanuel Obinna, Deputy Director, Vocational Education and Training Division of the ministry.
According to her, iodine deficiency remains a major challenge, particularly among children, as it can lead to developmental delays, learning difficulties, and other serious health issues.
“The simple yet effective solution is ensuring households consistently use adequately iodised salt.
“This assessment will help us understand the current consumption patterns, identify gaps and develop strategies to promote iodised salt use at the household level.
“We will explore household salt testing methods, survey approaches and community engagement strategies, and the roles of schools in promoting iodised salt,” she said.
A Public Health Nutrutionist, Chimay Thompson, said the meeting was apt and imperative as it would go a long way in tackling cognitive impairment in children.
“We are using education to tackle the this issue, using at least these primary school children in Nasarawa State. It can give us a clue of what is happening.
“Prevention is better and cheaper than cure. We don’t want, when the deficiency has started producing and we start seeing goiter shooting out, when it’s at an advanced stage.
“If we start early, using iodised salt for children, it will help us better in our household level,” she said.
She therefore called for collective action to prioritise the use of iodised salt so that cognitive development could start from early care childhood.
On his part, Prof. Dehinde Makanjuola, Head of Department, Nutrition and Dietetics, Nasarawa State University, Keffi, explained that deficiency in consumption of iodised salt could lead to learning outcomes.
Makanjuola said a study would be carried out on assessing the household level consumption of iodised salt using primary school.
According to him, we also want to assess the awareness of benefit of consumption of this iodised salt and the level of consumption as well as its importance and also the barrier factors that affect their consumption.
“From study, we know that low consumption of iodised salt will lead to mental retardation.
“It also affects, may be, even the brain development among children.
“When you find out that the child’s cognitive ability is also affected, the learning ability, and memory is affected, this eventually leads to out-of-school, ” he said .
The meeting brought together stakeholders from regulatory agencies such as the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON), National Agency for Food and Drug Administration (NAFDAC), and Ministry of Health, among others. (NAN)
