Foro Global sobre Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutrición (Foro FSN)

English translation below

Bonjour! Pour moi je pense que pour lutter contre la malnutrition dans le pays en developpement il faudrais recourir à l'intensification integré de la production des oeuf. C'est-à-dire intensifier la production tout en s'adaptant aux réalités locales du lieu de production.

Chercher le moyen de produir les oeufs en quantité et qualité économiquement rentable tout en respectant l'environnem

Hello!

I think that in order to fight malnutrition in developing countries it would be necessary to resort to the integrated intensification of egg production. That is to say to intensify the production while adapting to the local realities of the place of production.

We need to seek how to produce eggs in quantities and qualities that are economically profitable while at the same time respecting the environment.

English translation below

Estimados todos;

Me parece fascinante las contribuciones que se hacen en torno al incremento del consumo de huevos y su impacto en la nutrición de los niños, luego del paper publicado por Lanotti. Yo quisiera agregar el hecho de que nadie se pregunta qué piensa la población al respecto, por qué el consumo de huevo es bajo en las poblaciones en donde posiblemente se debe consumir más.

Por qué no preguntamos primero a las poblaciones, en el entorno de sus patrones de consumo, en su forma de preparar los alimentos, en las dietas que consumen, cómo ven el incremento del consumo de huevo. Por qué no incorporamos a los pequeños productores de las mismas poblaciones, e incluso a las mismas familias que tienen pollos y gallinas a su alrededor como mejorar su producción de huevos para el consumo y la venta y, de esta manera, no llegamos con los huevos, enriquecidos, con huevos en polvo o coloreados, como la solución mágica al problema de la desnutrición.

En la medida que no incorporemos a la población, en la solución de sus problemas, siempre habrá una brecha que no se la ha podido cruzar.

Promoción del consumo de huevo puede ser un vehículo por el cual se genere la participación de la población en el mercado al mismo tiempo que mejoren sus dietas de los niños y de la familia en general. Pero para ello necesitamos incorporar otras disciplinas, relacionadas a la organización social, al empoderamiento a la auto-sostenibilidad, para que sean ellos mismos los que adopten sus soluciones. Los años de experiencia nos muestran que las soluciones upper-down generalmente no logran los objetivos deseados, porque las poblaciones que son sujeto de intervenciones, no han tenido la oportunidad de hablar sobre su visión, su comida, sus patrones sociales y culturales en donde el huevo puede insertarse en forma permanente.

Dear All;

I find the contributions -following Lanotti´s paper- on increased egg consumption and its impact on child nutrition fascinating. However, I want to add that no one wonders what people think about this topic, and why egg consumption is lower than anticipated among populations that could benefit more from it.

I suggest asking people in first instance. About their consumption patterns, the ways they use for cooking food, their diets and their views on increased egg consumption. I also propose mainstreaming smallholders and even family poultry producers with the aim of improving egg production for sale and consumption. In this way we will not come up with fortified, powdered or colored eggs as the magic solution to undernutrition.

If we do not involve people in the solution of their own problems, there will always be a gap to bridge.

Promoting egg consumption can foster people´s participation in the market whilst improving children and family diets. To do this, other fields -related to social organization, empowerment or self-sustainability- need to be incorporated to allow people to adopt their own solutions. Experience shows that vertical solutions usually struggle to meet the desired targets as people are not given the opportunity to talk about their vision, food and social and cultural patterns where eggs can be embedded permanently.

Eggs are among the taboo foods for children and pregnant women in several African cultures. The food taboos are more or less adhered to and one of the factors is education: the more educated people are more likely to free themselves from taboos. Therefore, the less educated people, who are also at higher nutritional risk, are probably those who would avoid eggs and consequently would need to be exposed to behavioral change communication to overcome the taboo.

Another type of egg taboo is that connected to the (now false) belief that because eggs are high in cholesterol, they increase the risk of CVD. There is now firm scientific evidence to show that eggs are not atherogenic.

Finally, the vegan trend would act as deterrent to consuming eggs (and other animal foods) and this could have adverse consequences for growing children. It has been shown some years ago that animal source foods are needed for optimal growth.

Hélène Delisle, Ph.D.

Professeur émérite et associé

Département de nutrition, Faculté de Médecine

Pavillon Liliane-Stewart, Université de Montréal

Facilitator,

I started "One Village One Poultry Vet" Project - a socio-economic intensification programme to improve poultry production for dietary and economic benefits in western Kenya- Busia county in particular and it is successful.

Started with 20 small holder households in December 2016 and now targeting 200 farmers in two villages and there are positive results. Utilizing indigenous nutritional literacy content and building on it in a life long learning model has helped in the uptake of indigenous poultry as compared to the costly exotic poultry rearing.

Eating eggs by children is no longer a reserve for when they visit their grandmothers, or during ceremonies but has been picked up in family diets because of improved production in our intesification model.

Bonphace Mangeni-Western Kenya

To Saul Morris - thank you for your response and for facilitating this discussions.

I did not talk about conflict of interest, just wondered what such a cooperation was supposed to give. My question stands.

There is a lot of work to do regarding animal welfare and consideration on the environment and those need to systematically be added to such discussions. Otherwise we are just ignoring some of the most important factors around animal husbandry recognized, by FAO, as one of the main polluter. So the question is: for the sake of some nutrition benefits, how much are we willing to jeopardize the environment and therefore the health of people, of other animals, of other nutritious plants... Is the trade-off worth it? According to FAO and others, not really. The food (and water) used to feed the chicken could be used differently.

We could also mention that the poultry industry is also a heavy user of medication for the animals which are then transmitted to our health. Not sure this is something that could be avoided in the developing countries. We do not have exemplary models at home of industrial poultry farming (which by definition is not good for the environment or health) ... so not sure one exists in other parts of the world.

Facilitator,

It is clear evidence during the period of ramadan fasting in Kano eggs become scarce commodity with inflated market price simply because of the flash rise of demand of the egg commodity at the on set of the fasting. In fasting period there is need of tasty, highly nutrtious food ingredient that combines easily with several other ingredients to prepare variety breakfast (Iftar) meals. Egg is one of them. 

In another example, one of the states in Nigeria was informed of the benefits of egg particularly to school children, the head of government decreed every school child in the state must be served school meal that contained an egg. That contributed to increased egg demand which drive proliferation of egg production farms to meet the demand. Nutritional literacy is a good precursor of increased egg consumption, at least in this part of the world.

Thank you. 

In underdeveloped countries where poverty is the order of the day, people find it hard to purchase eggs. People feed and purchase food based on the quantity and not the quality. I think if youths who are intrested in poultry bussiness are supported with grants , subsidized and improved feeds then the cost of eggs will be reduced and accessible for the masses. Also there should be an interaction between the gown and town i.e. researches in the university should not just been dumped on supervisors shelf but extended to farmers.Thanks

Great to read all of the contributions this week.

Gerhard Flachowsky reminds us that by adding specific nutrients to chicken feed (in this case, iodine), one can increase the concentration of that nutrient in the eggs that the chickens lay. The concept has become familiar to consumers in some countries where DHA-enriched eggs are available for purchase. It essentially makes the egg a fortification vehicle, comparable, for example, to vitamin D enriched milk. Vitamin A and selenium are other micronutrients that could potentially be added in this way. The challenge will be to avoid making the eggs even more unaffordable to poor consumers by increasing the input cost (feed).

Dick Tinsley directly addresses this issue of affordability, directing us to a great tool which enables policy-makers to experience the dramatic trade-offs that the world’s poorest people have to make every day. It clearly shows why families in poor countries do not currently eat many eggs. The only way that this situation will change is if eggs become cheaper. And unfortunately, there are only two ways of making them cheaper: reducing the cost of feed, or increasing the scale of production. Both have challenges.

Rabiu Auwalu Yakasai shares an interesting experience from Nigeria, and suggests that “nutritional illiteracy” is the key constraint to consumption in this environment. This is in direct contradiction of the point made by Dick Tinsley. It would be great to see evidence that a programme which only educates families about the benefits of egg consumption can actually increase consumption. The special supplement finds that even including support to production, it is quite hard—but not impossible, as shown, for example, by Marquis et al.—to increase the consumption of smallholder families.

John Cheburet emphasises the challenge of the cost of chicken feed. One has to wonder whether chickens in Africa have to consume maize and soy? It would be great to learn about alternative feed formulations which bring down the cost of egg production while meeting the nutritional needs of layer hens. It would also be good to know why Ugandan eggs are cheaper than Kenyan eggs? Do they produce at larger scale?

Cedric Charpentier raises a concern about conflict of interest. I would like to clarify that the International Egg Commission had no role at all in the production of the series, nor any of the individual papers. Cedric also correctly notes that there is very little in the series about animal welfare or potential environmental impacts; this is why we specifically asked for comments on these topics in this Forum. We would love to hear from Forum members whether there are examples of production of eggs at scale in resource-poor countries where animal welfare has been adequately considered? And what are good models for minimising environmental impact in these settings?

Rabiu Auwalu Yakasai raises an interesting point about egg powder. Would it be a good way to give poorer consumers access to the benefits of egg consumption, or is it just a capitulation to foreign trade interests? Clearly, this situation already applies for milk, where most of Africa currently consumers imported powder milk rather than fresh domestic milk. In this case, countries like Kenya are now turning this around by setting up milk ATMs supplied by local producers. Should countries just say no to imported egg powder?

Kuruppacharil V. Peter raises the case of India, where egg consumption is a politically charged issue. He points out that attitudes vary considerably from state to state. He notes frequently cited concerns about cholesterol.  Readers may like to refer to the recent meta-analysis published in bmj (Ying Rong et al. 2013) which shows that “Higher consumption of eggs (up to one egg per day) is not associated with increased risk of coronary heart disease or stroke”.

Eggs of hen,duck and quil are common in the diet of middle and above middle class people.Eggs are classified under non-vegetarian food.An egg a day is a desirable food item.The recent propaganda against poultry egg especially the red portion is quite discouraging.Consumption of egg will lead to increase in bad cholestrol and may fascilitate cardio-vascular diseases.In 2013 Government of India passed the National Food Security Bill , which made access to food a legal right of the people.In states like Tamil Nadu, one egg was was included in the mid day meal scheme.The apprehension of people on use of poultry egg and heart diseases needs to be removed by educational tools.Recently I edited a book ZERO HUNGER INDIA:POLICIES AND PROGRAMMES published by Brillion Publishing New Delhi([email protected]) carries roles of fish,animal meat etc on NUTRITION SECURITY.

I am with Cedric point of view. Please don't drag innocent contributors to the forum into eggpolitics to make global winning views perhaps for a cornered business proposition elsewhere? I hope we are not ignorantly making good case for egg powder invasion of developing countries to the detriment of their natural egg potentials. 

Rabiu Auwalu Yakasai