Nutrition: Imperative Self-sufficiency!

Cameroon joined the rest of the globe on October 16, 2024 to commemorate yet another World Food Day; the 44th edition this time around. Customarily, the day is set aside to remind all and sundry, the world over, about the critical role food plays in peoples’ lives. A rare moment to highlight the importance of food to the population and the economy, examine the challenges countries and people face striking dietary balances as well as crusade on the need for collective efforts to create a world where no one goes hungry.
While there is usually a general theme, it is observed that all countries across the world do not face nutrition problems the same way. Some are already striving to ensure that the food their people eat is balanced (quantity is no longer their problem). Yet, others are still battling to get to satisfactory food supply levels. As such, the day is commemorated based on each context.
Cameroon joined the bandwagon on Wednesday October 16 and a commemorative ceremony at the esplanade of the National Museum in Yaounde served as an opportunity for government and the partners to re-echo the theme; “The right to food for a better life and future, leaving no one behind.” This was indeed an absolute call for all stakeholders to put hands on deck to enable Cameroonians eat better, in quantity and quality, so as to live happier. 
Understandably so as official statistics show that some 2.8 billion people worldwide cannot afford a healthy diet. That some ten per cent of Cameroonians suffer from acute food and nutritional insecurity makes the situation the more worrisome for government and the people.
According to a Study: WFP Cameroon Malnutrition Prevention and Treatment, October 2022, published on reliefweb, under nutrition remains a public health concern in Cameroon. According to the report, the four most affected regions of Cameroon are the Far North (37 per cent), North (41 per cent), Adamawa (38 per cent) and East (37 per cent). Another survey conducted in February 2021 showed persistently high rates of chronic malnutrition among children under five in these four regions (34.6 per cent in Adamawa, 32.8 per cent in the East, 36.4 per cent in the Far North and 40.2% per cent in the North region).
These statistics are disturbing and the prevailing situation marked by insecurity in some regions and the effects of climate change that leave no region indifferent require well-adapted measures to keep the population above the murky waters. It is difficult to imagine any sustainable development when people are unable to eat to satisfaction. Most, if not all, parents can attest to the fact that a well-fed family is largely spared from some maladies and by extension, certain health-related expenditures. There is therefore a lot to gain when households, communities and the country attain food self-sufficiency. In effect, it is the basis of any meaningful progress for, it is only when people are well fed that they can think better and push through shared growth. This explains why most vision-led systems always prioritise food self-sufficiency as the cornerstone of their sustainable socio-economic development. 
In fact, food self-sufficiency which is the ability of a region or country to produce enough food (especially staple crops) without needing to buy or import additional food, still remains a far-fetched dream in the country. There are regions still prone to famine and inhabitants struggle to eat, at least to their fill. Those that might boast of somewhat enough food are at the same time wanting in variety. It is common to see households dependent on one or two food items for long, simply because it is the harvesting season. Their meals are almost same from dawn to dusk and hunger always steps in once the items run out of stock.
It is no secret that food security exists when all people, at all times, have the physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food. Most studies have found Cameroon still lagging behind in this domain.  This is truly a call for concern looking at the importance of food self-sufficiency to the country and its people of all age groups.
Analysts hold that food security which the country has been struggling to attain goes beyond...