Al-Ghabban chairs a scientific symposium that addressing the challenges of hidden hunger at the Environmental Research Center
Under the patronage of the President of the University of Technology Prof. Dr. Ahmed Mohamed Hassan Al-Ghabban, the Environmental Research Center at the University of Technology, in cooperation with the Institute for Nutrition Research - Public Health Department at the Ministry of Health and Environment, and under the supervision of the Center's Director, Prof. Dr. Abdel-Hamid Mahmoud Jawad Al-Obaidi, held a scientific seminar via distance using the ZOOM platform Entitled "Addressing the Challenges of Hidden Hunger".
The symposium included two axes that were managed electronically by the Chairman of the Scientific Activity Committee at the Center Dr. Mokhalad A. H. and Assist. Lec. Zahraa Zahrao Farhan ,the rapporteur.
The first axis included a lecture entitled healthy nutrition strategy in Iraq given by Dr. Muhammad Jasim Ahmed, a doctor specializing in community medicine, the Nutrition Research Institute in the Public Health Department, in which he explained the importance of the national nutrition strategic plan prepared by the Ministry of Health and Environment in cooperation with the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children's Fund since the year 2012 and until 2021, and this plan aimed to lay a sound basis in terms of planning, organizing and managing the public sectors related to nutrition in a manner that ensures improving the health and nutritional status of the Iraqi individual and the indicators in the Iraqi governorates in general.
The researcher dealt with diseases of malnutrition for children under the age of five and the accompanying diseases of anemia, deficiency in the element of iron, vitamins, etc., and to treat these cases, a practical program was adopted to fortify basic foodstuffs such as flour using premix to increase the proportion of iron and food salt using the element iodine, adding that it was adopted. Many programs to support lunch and spread health awareness to school students and the community in general.
The lecturer recommended the necessity of scientific and research cooperation between academic institutions such as universities and research centers and between departments of the Ministry of Health and Environment in order to develop methods of fortifying food and fortifying it with the necessary elements to prevent the occurrence of diseases harmful to public health.
As for the second axis of the symposium, it included a lecture entitled the vital support of sustainable food given by the teacher in the Department of Sustainable Development at the center, Prof.Basem Hashem Faraj, in which he explained that the Food and Agriculture Organization has defined a sustainable food system as a system that provides healthy food that contains micronutrients. Microelements of vitamins and minerals, which are essential components of a high-quality diet to meet current nutritional needs while maintaining healthy ecosystems that can provide food for future generations with minimal negative impact on the environment, adding that these micronutrients are the basic building blocks of direct impact on health Human and in the absence of its presence at the required level causes the so-called hidden hunger, for example, zinc plays a vital role in participating in a wide range of vital cell-specific interactions and thus its decrease negatively affects the performance of these cells to achieve a sustainable food strategy and that vital support plays a fundamental role in enriching economic plants with nutrients. Minerals or vitamins that are not able to be produced at all or are produced b Limited quantities, and in order to alleviate hidden hunger, it is possible to follow traditional methods of enriching micro-crops, such as fertilizing the soil or spraying the shoot with a solution of nutrients. However, some strategic crops, for physiological or anatomical reasons, and others cannot be absorbed accurately and then transferred to the plant, then it is possible to go to breeding methods. They are based on the genetic foundations without manipulating the genetic material such as selection and crosses.
The lecturer recommended that it is necessary to determine the needs of the Iraqi individual based on the surveys of the Ministry of Health and Environment, and then go to research programs for treatment and adopt a national program for participation in it by the relevant specialized authorities in coordination with the Nutrition Research Institute.
At the end of the symposium, discussion was opened for the participants, opinion and dialogue were given, in which the director of the center praised the participants.
