Ali Zakari, Scheelbeek Pauline F D, Dalzell Sarah, Hadida Genevieve, Segnon Alcade C, M'boob Sulayman, Prentice Andrew M, Green Rosemary
Nutrition and Planetary Health Theme, MRC Unit the Gambia at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Banjul, Gambia.
Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK.
Glob Food Sec. 2023 Jun;37:100695. doi: 10.1016/j.gfs.2023.100695.
In common with many nations undergoing a nutrition transition, micronutrient deficiencies, undernutrition and overnutrition coexist in The Gambia. Addressing these challenges simultaneously would require transformational changes in the country's food system. However, the evidence base that would enable informed decision-making in the Gambian food system has been scant, despite several sources of routinely-collected data being available. This descriptive study brings together data from four open-access global databases on food supply, political, economic, and demographic variables, and nutrition and health between 1990 and 2017 to study potential leverage points for improvement in the food system. It compares trends in food supply and nutritional outcomes in The Gambia against regional and global averages, and identifies potential drivers taken from a food systems framework. The data show that, over the past three decades, total energy supply has increased, and obesity is rising quickly, but iron deficiency persists in a proportion of the population. Overall diet composition is poor, with lower availability of fruit and vegetables and higher supply of sugar and oils compared to regional and global averages. Domestic production is low for most food groups and so a high dependence on imports from other countries bridges the gap in terms of energy supply. Measures of economic development, particularly GDP, were positively related with supply of cereals and animal source foods over time, but no such relationship was observed with fruit and vegetable supply. Food system policy to improve nutrition and health outcomes in The Gambia needs to focus on improving the diversity of food supply - especially fruit and vegetables - and maximizing national domestic production to reduce reliance on food imports. The use of open-source global datasets can be feasible in exploring food system characteristics and trends at the national level and could be applied in other contexts.
与许多正在经历营养转型的国家一样，冈比亚同时存在微量营养素缺乏、营养不足和营养过剩的问题。要同时应对这些挑战，该国的食品系统需要进行变革性的改变。然而，尽管有多个常规收集数据的来源，但冈比亚食品系统中能够支持明智决策的证据基础却很薄弱。这项描述性研究汇集了1990年至2017年期间四个开放获取的全球数据库中关于食品供应、政治、经济和人口变量以及营养与健康的数据，以研究食品系统中潜在的改进杠杆点。它将冈比亚的食品供应趋势和营养结果与区域和全球平均水平进行比较，并从食品系统框架中确定潜在驱动因素。数据显示，在过去三十年中，总能量供应增加，肥胖率迅速上升，但仍有一定比例的人口存在缺铁问题。总体饮食结构较差，与区域和全球平均水平相比，水果和蔬菜的供应量较低，糖和油的供应量较高。大多数食品类别的国内产量较低，因此对其他国家进口的高度依赖弥补了能量供应方面的差距。随着时间的推移，经济发展指标，特别是国内生产总值，与谷物和动物源食品的供应呈正相关，但与水果和蔬菜的供应没有这种关系。冈比亚改善营养和健康结果的食品系统政策需要专注于提高食品供应的多样性——尤其是水果和蔬菜——并最大限度地提高国内产量，以减少对食品进口的依赖。使用开源全球数据集在探索国家层面的食品系统特征和趋势方面可能是可行的，并且可以应用于其他情况。
