Nutrition can be golden thread for fragile aid system

Afshan Khan is Coordinator of the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement and U.N. Assistant Secretary-General. 

The recent Nutrition for Growth Summit in Paris was an unexpected success, delivering a record $27.55 billion to reduce global malnutrition.

The commitments came amid severe cuts to development aid, offering a glimmer of hope in an increasingly challenging global climate for sustainable development.

But in truth, those pledges made in Paris are a necessary step towards making up for years of underfunding and neglect.

Development assistance for nutrition was already at critically low levels, receiving just 0.37% – or just over $1 billion – of official development assistance (ODA) in 2022.

According to the World Bank’s most recent investment framework, an additional $13 billion is needed annually for the next 10 years to address undernutrition.

The chronic underfunding of nutrition has been compounded by an order of magnitude with recent cuts of 44% in funding from Western donors, which estimates suggest will affect 2.3 million children and could result in as many as 369,000 additional child deaths.

We cannot afford to let the pledges made in Paris become empty promises. The global community must act swiftly and strategically to ensure that the promised nutrition funding materialises – and that it is used in the most impactful way.

Climate change effect

Good nutrition is foundational. It defines health, resilience, and productivity for all of society. Without it, health systems struggle, economies stall, and generations are held back from fulfilling their potential.

In Africa alone, undernutrition limits children’s potential productivity to just 40%, with long-term consequences for growth and development.

Climate change is exacerbating the crisis.

It threatens food production, undermines good nutrition, and increases the likelihood of wasting and underweight by nearly 50% in areas most affected by climate change.

At the same time, almost half of all adults globally are now overweight or obese, which is driving up healthcare costs and straining already overburdened systems.

Nutrition is one of the smartest investments that countries can make - a development best buy. Every dollar spent on reducing undernutrition generates $23 in economic benefits.

Where funding is constrained, the path forward for realising these returns with limited additional investment is clear: nutrition integration.

This was the defining theme in Paris. Countries that embed nutrition into their broader development strategies – across economic growth, health, agriculture, education, social protection, and climate action – will build resilience, reduce future costs, and unlock greater human potential.

In a world of limited nutrition finance, we must look for opportunities to work better across sectors for greater impact.

From combining vaccination and nutrition services to integrating nutrition outcomes across humanitarian investments, to factoring in nutrition within food systems, every department and sector has the opportunity to support better nutrition.

The newly formed Coalition for Nutrition Integration, launched at the Paris summit, is the world’s vehicle for action. It brings together governments, donors, multilateral agencies, and civil society to ensure that nutrition is embedded into every sector that touches human development.

This is the time to rethink how aid is structured, ensuring that even as nutrition-specific assistance declines, funding from across sectors supports nutrition-sensitive programmes.

That is how we will protect human capital, strengthen food systems, build resilience in fragile and conflict-affected settings, and secure a healthier, more prosperous future.

The coalition, of which the Scaling up Nutrition (SUN) Movement is a prominent anchor, must seize on opportunities to champion nutrition integration at global events and dialogues, including the upcoming World Health Assembly’s resolution on extending nutrition targets, the Financing for Development process, the UN Food Systems Summit stocktaking moment, the G7 and G20 summits, and COP30 climate talks.

We cannot nourish the future without nourishing our children. And we cannot let short-term cuts destroy long-term gains.

Nutrition must become the golden thread, running through every policy, every programme, and every investment. Only then can we stop this funding crisis from becoming a catastrophe, and build a world in which every child, every mother, and every community has the chance to thrive.