How to Increase Demand, Availability, Accessibility, & Consumption of Highly Nutritious Food

It presents insights and implications from the Cost of Diet (COD) studies conducted in Samburu and Turkana counties in Kenya. The brief highlights four key insights: (1) limited purchasing power and costly nutritious foods are barriers to uptake of recommended maternal, infant, and young child feeding practices; (2) removal of underlying social and cultural barriers is required to encourage demand for cost-effective nutritious diets; (3) improvements in local access to and household production of nutritious foods will enable improvements in food consumption behaviors; and (4) women's economic empowerment, including improved decision-making in household economic planning, is critical to increasing the purchasing power of women for improved nutritious diets. The brief concludes by outlining priority areas for continued learning and provides contact information for the Chief of Party.