Impact of infant & young child feeding & caring practices on nutritional status & health.

The exclusive breast feeding rates in India at 6 months is about 46 per cent. At 6-8 months only 54 per cent of breast fed and 75 per cent of non breast fed infants are initiated into complimentary feeds. At the start of the second year of life only about 42 per cent of infants receive the recommended appropriate foods at appropriate frequency. There is evidence to suggest that the persistent undernutrition in the country is associated with these inadequate feeding practices prevalent in the country. Experiences from several studies suggest that household level behavioural changes could be achieved by using appropriate behaviour change communication principles, change agents specially trained to address some of these issues, consistent messages, multiple channels to saturate population coverage and engaging communities in a participatory manner and encouraging their ownership of such interventions.