Food and nutrition security in childhood
This course focuses on current food and nutrition security challenges in the context of poverty, inequity and sustainability during childhood and discusses paradigm shifts needed in actions and research.
Main content
Course leader
Inger Aakre, Associate Professor at the Centre for International Health, University of Bergen and a research scientist at the Institute of Marine Research.
Ulrike Spielau, Research Coordinator and PostDoc at the Mohn Nutrition Research Laboratory, UiB.
Course lecturers
Jutta Dierkes, Professor at Centre for Nutrition, Department of Clinical Medicine and Mohn Nutrition Research Laboratory, Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Bergen
Sigrun Henjum, Professor at the Faculty of Health Sciences, Oslo Metropolitan University
Anne Hatløy, Associate Professor, Centre for International Health, University of Bergen
Pétur B. Juliusson, Professor at Department of Paediatrics, Haukeland University Hospital and at Department of Health Registry Research and Development, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Bergen
Ingrid Kvestad, Regional Centre for Child and Youth Mental Health and Child Welfare, NORCE Norwegian Research Center, Bergen
Synnøve Næss Sleire, Post-Doc at the Institute of Marine Research (IMR), Bergen
Hanne Rosendahl-Riise, Associate Professor at Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Bergen
Catherine M. Schwinger, Senior Advisor at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH)
Ingunn M. Stadskleiv Engebretsen, Professor at the Centre for International Health, University of Bergen
Food insecurity is a persisting global challenge and has recently been on the rise. Also, the world population is increasing while our food systems are largely contributing to hunger, inequity, and global pollution.
The sustainable development goals have embraced the WHO Decade of Nutrition ambitions 2016-2025 targets focusing on ending malnutrition affecting 1/3 of the world’s population. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World (SOFI) report notes that despite progress in some regions, global trends in child undernutrition – including stunting, wasting, micronutrient deficiencies, overweight and obesity in children, continue to be of great concern. An estimated 45 million children under five years of age suffer from wasting, 149 million have stunted growth and development due to chronic lack of nutritious food in their diet while 39 million are affected by overweight.
This course focuses on acknowledging current food and nutrition security challenges in the context of poverty, inequity and sustainability during childhood and discusses paradigm shifts needed in actions and research.
The course will give a thorough insight into the following topics:
- An introduction to food security
- Malnutrition, causes, consequences, and treatment
- Micronutrients and child health
- Infant and young child feeding
- Dietary assessment: how can we measure what people eat?
- Food and Nutrition Security – Future perspectives
- Food and Nutrition Security – Where should we go from here?
The course will include lectures, group work, student activities and discussions and empower young researchers to identify their own research questions and develop research projects. The students will be able to present and discuss their own research with the other attendants and course leaders throughout the course.
Learning outcomes
Knowledge
The candidates will:
- Get advanced knowledge regarding the nutritional challenges globally for children in our world today
- Be able to analyze individual and societal factors that affect diet and health globally focusing on food security and diversity in children
- Be able to analyze factors improving food availability, access and quality for children
- Can evaluate the application of various nutritional assessment techniques and their usefulness in diverse field settings
- Can discuss the key challenges of nutrition and health during childhood
Skills
The candidates will be able to formulate problems in assessing and handling food insecurity and identify research questions which need to be addressed in the next decade. They will further be able to create and develop their own research projects
The students will be able to:
- Analyze a subject matter in global nutrition, diet and health, in light of relevant policy and research.
- Apply the most common nutrition strategies and interventions focusing on children and mothers based on knowledge of the context
- Use relevant methods for research focusing on use of scientific literature in an independent manner about nutritional preventive strategies relevant for SDG 1,2,3 and food as a human right
General competence
The candidates will be able to:
- Identify key challenges and implications of public health nutrition research in childhood
- Present relevant global nutrition and health problems focusing on children.
- Contribute to new thinking about global nutrition research literature.
Reading list
FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO. 2022. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022. Repurposing food and agricultural policies to make healthy diets more affordable. Rome, FAO.
Credits
Participation at the BSRS is credited under the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS). Participants submitting an essay, in a form of a publishable manuscript of 10-20 pages, after the end of the summer school will receive 10 ECTS. Deadline for submission will be decided by your course leader.
It is also possible to participate without producing an essay. This will give you 5 ECTS. In order to receive credits, we expect full participation in the course-specific modules, plenary events and roundtables.
Course leaders
Inker Aakre is an Associate professor at the Centre for International Health, University of Bergen and a research scientist at the Institute of Marine Research. Her background is in public health nutrition and her work comprises micronutrient deficiencies, food composition and nutrition and health from both high- and low-income countries. Her research has mainly involved vulnerable groups, especially children and pregnant women. She is teaching and supervising bachelor-, master and Ph.D. candidates in nutrition.
Ulrike Spielau is a Research Coordinator and PostDoc at the Mohn Nutrition Research Laboratory. Her background is Nutritional Science. She worked with dietary intake and health effects in children, with a focus on obesity. Further, she did establish a nutritional health score for children which assessed the conformity with German Nutrition recommendations for children and pregnant women and did support the Systematic review centre during the update of the Nordic Nutrition Recommendations 2022.