Study hails Poshan tracker for real-time monitoring

Tribune News Service

Aksheev Thakur

New Delhi, March 11

India’s Poshan Tracker increases accountability and helps ensure that nutrition interventions reach the last mile, stated medical journal The Lancet in an analytical study. It said the technology represented an unprecedented opportunity to evaluate the transformative potential of large-scale, real-time nutrition monitoring.

Poshan Tracker is the largest mobile phone-based nutrition surveillance system. Boosting transparency, it provides data on the functioning of anganwadi centres and receipt of care services, including the provision of supplementary food for women, children and adolescent girls.

The Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems, the University of Edinburgh and Anuvaad Solutions analysed the Poshan Tracker data from anganwadi centres between July 2022 and September 2023 across all states and union territories of India.

“The proportion of anganwadi centres that are open for at least 15 days a month increased from only 35 per cent in July 2022 to 89 per cent in September 2023. Similarly the proportion of anganwadi centres that were open for at least 21 days a month increased from 24 per cent to 78 per cent in the past 15 months,” the study said.

The number of beneficiaries receiving supplementary food also jumped from 4.1 million to 20.9 million in this period.

Besides, 83.55 million children aged 0–6 years, amounting to 94 per cent of children registered at anganwadi centres, had their height and weight measured in September 2023. This implied a substantial increase since July 2022, when only 40.1 million (45 per cent) children aged 0–6 years were measured.

Union Minister for Women and Child Development, Smriti Irani said, “The Lancet article serves as a compelling testimony to Poshan Tracker’s pivotal role in transforming nutrition delivery services, marking a vital stride in India’s spirited fight against malnutrition. It is reshaping nutrition programmes by enabling real-time monitoring.”

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