Nutrition Initiatives in Africa and Asia
Friedman School gets $15 million from USAID for new programs
The Friedman School will be leading new nutrition-focused programs in Asia and Africa, thanks to two recent grants totaling $15 million from the U. S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
Faculty at the school will lead a consortium of U.S.-based institutions and developing country partners in implementing two concurrent five-year programs across the two continents. The programs will support the federal government’s new Feed the Future initiative, which seeks to improve nutrition outcomes for children and women in very poor countries.
The programs will be developed and implemented jointly by U.S. and host country institutions and scientists.
Tufts faculty will take the lead in augmenting the education of faculty at host country universities and training institutions, and work to improve host government technical capacities to deal with nutrition, food security and health problems.
The programs will also support research on ways to enhance farmers’ incomes, productivity and market participation, and to create policies to improve nutritional outcomes.
“These far-reaching activities have the potential to make a profound impact, not only in the target countries but in neighboring nations as well,” says Eileen T. Kennedy, dean of the Friedman School.
Patrick Webb, a Friedman School professor and dean for academic affairs, will lead the activities in Asia, while William Masters, a professor of nutrition, will head activities in Africa. Webb and Masters will coordinate an innovative research-to-practice program that addresses nutritional, agricultural and food security needs.
The consortium of U.S. institutions that will work with Tufts includes the Harvard University School of Public Health; the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health; Purdue University’s Department of Agricultural Economics; Tuskegee University’s College of Agricultural, Environmental and Natural Sciences; and Development Alternatives, Inc.