Political Economy of Nutrition Policy in Senegal
Senegal has a reputation for having one of the most effective and far-reaching nutritionservice delivery systems in Africa. Chronic malnutrition has dropped to less than 20 percent, oneof the lowest in Sub-Saharan Africa. The reduction in stunting...
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| Format: | Report |
| Language: | English |
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World Bank, Washington, DC
2019
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/467841568925115388/Political-Economy-of-Nutrition-Policy-in-Senegal http://hdl.handle.net/10986/32471 |
| Summary: | Senegal has a reputation for having one
of the most effective and far-reaching nutritionservice
delivery systems in Africa. Chronic malnutrition has dropped
to less than 20 percent, oneof the lowest in Sub-Saharan
Africa. The reduction in stunting in particular has been
deemed a success in Senegal with the prevalence of child
stunting one of the lowest in Sub-Saharan Africa in absolute
terms (Nene 2017). This success has at least in part been
attributed to broad-based government commitment to
nutrition, which has grown from US$0.3 million per year in
2002 to US$5.7 million per year in 2015, increasing from
approximately 0.02 percent to 0.12 percent of the national
budget. Yet concerns remain regarding whether the level of
government support for nutrition is sufficient and the
degree to which nutrition has been as effectively
“mainstreamed” across major line ministries, such as
agriculture, education, water and sanitation,
socialprotection and health, to support both
nutrition-specific and nutrition-sensitive interventions.
Moreover, the nutrition field as a whole is characterized by
a myriad of actors (international donors, NGOs, and
technical support agencies) whose interventions are not well
coordinated, leading to duplications of effort and
inefficiencies in the provision of services. A series
ofexternal shocks, including food shortages stemming from
drought, the global financial crisis, and the instability of
prices for local foodstuffs since 2007, has revealed the
continued need for additional investment in nutrition and
better intersectoral coordination of activities to counter
cyclical attention to nutrition and a predominant focus on
food insufficiency rather than abroader focus on nutrition.
To this end, the government of Senegal, through the CLM, is
in the process of drafting the new PSMN to develop a reform
agenda for the sector. The PSMN will lay out a framework and
timeline for the development of a nutrition financing
strategy that will requirespecific analysis of the sector
spending and financial basis, linking it to the coverage and
quality of nutrition services and assessing the contribution
of different sectors and actors to the budget. As part of
the Analysis & Perspective: 15 Years of Experience in
the Development of Nutrition Policy in Senegal series, the
World Bank commissioned this report to elaborate the
specific political challenges to and opportunities for
further raising the profile ofnutrition on the government’s
agenda and secure a sustainable effort to reduce maternal
and child malnutrition. The nutrition agenda is often prone
to political economy challenges when it competes for
government support, as the impact of nutritional
intervention is neither immediate nor tangible. Though the
benefits of proper nutrition are life-long and are
foundational to proper growth and development, nutrition can
fall by the wayside in policymakers’ inevitably
shorter-termoutlook. With this in mind, the objective of
this report was to identify the policy and political levers
that can be used to foster government leadership and
galvanize intersectoral coordination that mainstreams
nutrition into government policies and programs and
effectively, efficiently, and sustainably delivers nutrition
interventions in Senegal. |
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