Health organizations urge Odisha government to stop fortified rice distribution in food schemes

NEW DELHI: Members of several health organizations, doctors, nutritionists and social scientists have written a letter to the Odisha government demanding suspension of distribution of fortified rice in mid-day meals and various other government schemes. The members have also asked the government to “call for a comprehensive review meeting, to assess the need for such an approach, alternatives available for the same, and involve civil society groups in such a dialogue.”

The letter addressed to the department of school and mass education, department of food supplies and consumer welfare, and the department of women and child development comes after a recent incident of children complaining of stomach pain after consuming fortified rice in village Jhankarpali in Khaprakhol Block of Bolangir district.

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“This is no an isolated incident of complaints with regard to Fortified Rice in Odisha, and this is not just about unfounded fears of “plastic rice” that we are seeing here. Yes, there is lack of information and awareness about Fortified Rice, but these reports from the ground indicate more than that, and it is more than fears about ‘plastic rice’,” the letter read.

The health representatives showed concern regarding

(i) communities’ lack of preference towards fortified rice,

(ii) it is about a top-down undemocratic approach towards something as basic as communities’ preferences for food and their right to know, and right to informed choices

(iii) it also seems to be about people experiencing adverse impacts from consumption of fortified rice.

Iron-fortified rice in mid-day meals

The organizations also raised some pertinent issues both about the unproven efficacy of rice fortification as well as safety concerns about iron-fortified rice. They asked to take proven, holistic, community-controlled dietary-diversity-enhancing approaches to address diseases like Anaemia.

It is well known that iron-fortified foods are contra-indicated for people with thalassemia, and sickle-cell Anaemia as well as particular stages of infectious diseases like Malaria, Tuberculosis etc. This is also not administered when there is severe acute malnourishment, and such SAM cases are known in Odisha (and other states) as the NRCs indicate, the letter said.

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“If this is the unanimously accepted medical advice, how can a government feed its citizens iron-fortified rice, including to those who have been identified with the above medical conditions, as well as those who suffer from these conditions but have not been screened? How is this being done in schemes that are actually entitlements of the citizens under the National Food Security Act 2013?,” the doctors asked.

“We write to you to express our deep concerns and objections to this approach to Nutrition in Odisha, which is in fact gaining good name in other states for its more holistic approaches around Nutrition Gardens (“Mo Upkari Bagicha” programme under OLM) and reviving millets in our food systems (Odisha Millets Mission). Odisha is also the state which has the distinction of civil society groups reviving traditional paddy varieties which have been documented to be nutritionally superior. It is a state where scientific research has occurred on the nutritional importance of uncultivated forest foods. When so many solutions are available, in a state where public financing is not an issue, why are risky approaches being adopted for addressing malnutrition?,” the organisations further said.