There are more Jamaican children who are overeating than those who are eating too little, according to a survey on nutrition coordinated by the Early Childhood Commission (ECC).

Samms-Vaughan... we have greater concern about over-nutrition than we have about under-nutrition at this time

Over-nutrition is running at a bulky seven to eight per cent of those surveyed while under-nutrition is at a meagre three to four per cent, according to chair of the ECC Professor Maureen Samms-Vaughan.

"We have greater concern about over-nutrition than we have about under-nutrition at this time, and this (is in) keeping with what is happening in the rest of the world," Professor Samms-Vaughan disclosed last Thursday.

She made the comment as she discussed the new five-year strategic plan for early childhood development, which is being rolled out under the leadership of the ECC.

Proper nutrition is one of a number of targets to be met over the next five years under the strategic plan, with the main goals being effective parenting education; effective preventive health; effective screening, diagnosis and intervention for children deemed at risk; safer learner-centred early childhood institutions; and effective curriculum delivery by trained practitioners.

Professor Samms-Vaughan said the ECC had been coordinating a multi-sectoral committee aimed at reducing malnutrition in young children. She said a nutrition project was successfully piloted in St Mary recently, the results of which would be used to guide the development of a national early childhood nutrition programme.

To this end, the ECC chair said a menu and recipes for a 20-day cycle had been developed by the Caribbean Food and Nutrition Institute (CFNI). The menu includes options for children who are vegetarians, as well as recipes for emergency situations when there may be no stoves available for cooking.

"They have been pre-tested on children. The children love them," Professor Samms-Vaughan said. "In the St Mary project, the children went home asking their parents for more fruits and vegetables after having the meals developed."

She also said manuals for food service operations had been developed, and guidelines for the purchasing, storage, production, service, monitoring and reporting of the nutrition status of early childhood institutions.

The menus and recipes will be distributed to all early childhood institutions at no cost to them.

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