Bharat SainiLast Updated on August 16, 2018 by Bharat Saini
POSHAN (PM’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment) Abhiyaan, the National Nutrition Mission to address Malnutrition through Convergence, Use of Technology and a Targeted approach, to 315 Districts across all States and UTs, launched by Prime Minister, Narendra Modi at Jhunjhunu in Rajasthan on March 08, 2018 on the occasion of International Women’s Day, had been approved by the Union Cabinet on November 30, 2017 with a three year budget of Rs.9046.17 crore commencing from 2017-18. Government of India has signed a loan deal worth $ 200 million with the World Bank on May 7, 2018 that will support the first phase scale up to 315 districts for the POSHAN Abhiyaan and would help in achieving India’s goal of reducing stunting in children 0-6 years of age from 38.4% to 25% by the year 2022. A large component of POSHAN Abhiyaan involves gradual scaling-up of the interventions supported by the ongoing World Bank assisted Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) Systems Strengthening and Nutrition Improvement Project (ISSNIP) to all districts in the country over a 3-year period.
- POSHAN Abhiyaan will focus on improving the coverage and quality of ICDS nutrition services to pregnant and lactating women and children under 3 years of age,
- Will include investments in improving the skills and capacities of ICDS staff and community nutrition workers,
- Institute mechanisms of community mobilization and behavior change communication,
- Strengthen systems of citizen engagement and grievance redress
- Establish mobile technology based tools for improved monitoring and management of services for better outreach to beneficiaries during the critical 1,000 day window for nutrition impact.
- Ensure convergence of all nutrition related schemes and provide performance based incentives to states and community nutrition and health workers, facilitating a focus on results.
- POSHAN Abhiyaan through the targets will strive to reduce the level of stunting, under-nutrition, anemia and low birth weight babies.
- It will create synergy, ensure better monitoring, issue alerts for timely action, and encourage States/UTs to perform, guide and supervise the line Ministries and States/UTs to achieve the targeted goals.
- More than 10 crore people will be benefitted by this programme.
- All the States and districts will be covered in a phased manner i.e. 315 districts in 2017-18, 235 districts in 2018-19 and remaining districts in 2019-20
- Swasth Bharat Preraks would function as catalyst for fast tracking the implementation of Poshan Abhiyaan.
- Five e-ILA (e-Incremental Learning Approach) courses and two ECCE (Early Childhood Care and Education) software modules have been launched on March 20, 2018 for POSHAN Abhiyaan by the Ministry of Women and Child Development.
- e-ILA is an online system where programme functionaries will become more effective by learning to plan and execute each task correctly and consistently through methodical and ongoing capacity building.
- ECCE module is to guide trainers to train Anganwadi Workers so that they are able to plan and conduct appropriate ECE activities.
