Systems Actions to Malnutrition in All Its Forms in Chinese and South-East Asian Cities - Developing Double-Duty, Population-Level Interventions

This MRC funded project is aimed to develop multi-sectoral, double-duty, population-level interventions to reduce malnutrition in all its forms in Chinese and South-East Asian (SEA) cities through a systems-based, co creation approach with policy makers.

Malnutrition in all its forms broadly includes undernutrition (e.g. underweight and lack of certain key nutrients) and overnutrition (e.g. obesity and related chronic non-communicable diseases, such as type 2 diabetes). Malnutrition in all its forms is the largest cause of disease and premature death globally and in South-East Asia (SEA). Its health impacts are twice as high as that of tobacco use and high blood pressure. This public health challenge is also associated with heavy social and economic burdens. Different forms of malnutrition share common causes, especially within food systems that are promoting these various forms of malnutrition, which can co-occur in the same individual, household or country at the same time. Locally relevant solutions will need to be generated in relation to people’s eating habits and food cultures (e.g. the local food systems) as well as general living environments. Therefore, the seemingly different nutrition problems can be improved through common solutions targeting the wider systems of people’s daily lives. Current approaches to interventions are not reducing undernutrition fast enough and have failed to control the rise of obesity and related chronic diseases. These problems have rarely been considered and managed together in an integrated way. To effectively combat this largely preventable public health challenge, we need a new way of working that recognises the connections between different forms and causes of malnutrition within a wider context and creates double-duty actions to address them together.