Initiative to tackle newborn malnutrition in rural India promoted by the Indian Consulate in NY

April 25 :
An event was held earlier this month at the Consulate General of India in New York to promote the Newborn Nutritional Health Initiative. The initiative is led by WHEELS Global Foundation, a social impact platform including the global IIT alumni network. Health Spoken Tutorials (HST) at IIT Bombay are part of the initiative's plan to combat infant malnutrition by educating mothers on how to breastfeed their children properly and how to make healthy food choices.

To have a significant impact, the Wheels Global Foundation has been collaborating with rural communities and state governments in India for the past 17 to 18 years. According to Ambassador Binay Pradhan, there is still a gap due to the large population and the fact that the technological side is not addressed in certain circumstances, even if the federal and state governments of India are making efforts in this direction.

His words were accompanied by admiration for the effort being done by the IIT alumni in rallying financial support, collaborating with local authorities, national health missions, societies, and communities to address issues that might otherwise go unnoticed.

An programme is being scaled up in one of India's biggest states, Madhya Pradesh, with the help of a $400,000 grant from the Rural India Supporting Trust (RIST) in Washington D.C. This will have an influence on the lives of almost 10 million women and babies.

With the help of technology, innovation, an impact ecosystem, and public-private collaborations, we can bring about equal-scale optimism through initiatives like these, which in turn allows us to provide compelling and repeatable high-impact solutions that touch the lives of millions. President of WHEELS Global Foundation Ratan Agarwal stated that this is the expectation of the IIT brand by society and the country.

Newborns in some parts of Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, and Maharashtra acquired as much as five times as much weight in the first six months, which is far more than what is considered healthy according to the World Health Organisation.

Our goal is to reduce infant malnutrition in Madhya Pradesh through the use of this money and our collaboration with Wheels Global. It is critical to tackle childhood malnutrition early on since it hinders children's growth and development and affects them throughout their lives, according to Paul Glick, executive director of RIST.