In Bangladesh, 21 million people, or one in every eight, still cannot afford nutritious food.

This emerged from a joint survey on food availability and purchasing power, carried out by the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) and the government of Bangladesh.

It says that because of unregulated eating habits and lack of awareness, large numbers of people in Bangladesh are deprived of the nutrition they need. As a result, 31 per cent of children are still not developing properly physically.

A nutritious diet means that the daily menu contains food from six groups: carbohydrates, protein, vitamins, minerals, water and fat.

But in Bangladesh people still depend on too much rice and on food with insufficient nutrients, and put little emphasis on other nutritious foods such as vegetables, fish and meat, eggs, milk and lentils.

The study identifies poverty, lack of awareness of proper diets and lack of access to safe food as the main causes of malnutrition. Many cannot afford nutritious food such as fish, meat, vegetables and fruit. Others can afford it but do not know which foods to eat, or how much.

Source: BBC Bangla. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.