3rd FANUS Held
The 3rd Federation of African Nutrition Societies (FANUS) meeting was held in Arusha, Tanzania from 25-29th May 2015. The Federation of African Nutrition Societies (FANUS) is a conglomeration of nutrition societies of African nations with the vision to promote and sustain nutrition security and national development in all countries of Africa.
The congress was attended by more than 250 experts of nutrition and related disciplines from 20 countries under the theme “Nutrition in Africa at Crossroads”. The experts, who came from government, field practitioners, academia, NGOs, research, International Union of Nutrition Sciences and bilateral organisations debated and analysed the challenges of improving nutrition in Africa and the way forward.
Below are the declaration from the participants at the of the congress:
DECLARATION
- We call on the African Union to commit at least 3% of all Sector budgets for nutrition to ensure that the cross-sectoral issues which affect nutrition can be adequately addressed.
- We call for clearer visibility for nutrition including specific funding commitments in the implementation of the SDGs framework.
- We advocate clear, streamlined and fit-for-purpose national nutrition policies and governance frameworks, their coordination, implementation, monitoring & evaluation and overall accountability for scaling up.
- We African nutritionists recognize the competition for limited financial resources and urge prioritized investments to ensure measurable impact in meeting national nutritional needs
- We recognize the initiatives and efforts made by African Nutrition Professional bodies and our international partners to help address capacity gaps in the nutrition workforce and advocate national institutional support and commitment to sustain the momentum and allow for scalingup such efforts
- We African nutritionists pledge to work collaboratively with the African Union and its relevant institutions such as NEPAD to provide professional expertise, leadership and support in realizing continental goals for nutrition
- FANUS (in its Capacity building efforts) supports and will work with other relevant organizations in efforts to improve harmonization of competency based nutrition training in institutions in member countries and support improvements in standards and efforts towards professional recognition and regulation.
Full report and photos can be accessed here