4^th Global Food Security, Food Safety & Sustainability Conference May 10-11, 2019 London, UK

Biography:

Patrice Lekeraho Mirindi is 27 years. He is an agricultural engineer and an agricultural economist. He is an alumnus of the African Economic Research Consortium. He is a Congolese (DRC). He is finalizing his master in a Collaborative Master in Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Nairobi in Kenya in collaboration with the University of Pretoria in South Africa. His areas of specialization are food and nutrition policy analysis, agricultural policy analysis, international trade policy analysis and quantitative methods for policy analysis. Concerning his research, he is currently working on households demand for food and nutrition deficiency in the DRC.

Abstract:

All the countries members of the United Nation are committed to achieving SDG 2. Africa has seen the least progress in terms of improvement towards malnutrition prevalence. Particularly in DRC, around 4.5 million people are chronic food insecurity, the country has been ranked 176th out of 189 Human Development Index. Due to lack of data, it is hard to have indicators that give a current state of the food security and nutrition yet the situation is extremely alarming. Different studies have been conducted to give an overview of the nutritional status and economic changes in the country. Moreover, studies have shown that DRC faces a higher variability in time and space in its economy that should lead to nutrition transition. Unfortunately, there is no information on household behaviour or choice for diet in order to understand their motivation for the selection of food. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to assess the consumption trends of selected food groups and nutrient deficiencies. In order to achieve this, we have three Specific objectives, to map diet compositions and their consumption trends between 2005 and 2012, and to map the nutrient deficiency as well as the trends. This study explains the vulnerability of DRC households towards food security and the nutrient deficiencies by province. The study used secondary data from the National Household Surveys collected between 2005 and 2012. Our results suggested that household spend ¾ of their budget on food. We were able to classify DRC in five different groups having almost similar food intake. Moreover, about than 60 per cent of the budget is allocated to the food group of cereals, root and tubers as well as meat and fish. We also find that there is a deficiency in zinc, calcium, Iron and vitamin B12 in almost all the provinces for both rural and urban areas. For protein, calories, folate, and vitamin A the consumption is quite acceptable. However, the trends seem to be negative.