International Development: Aid Distribution

Baroness Manzoor Excerpts

Thursday 6th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, gender equality is and will continue to be a top development priority. Girls and women across the world are held back by systematic and entrenched inequality and discrimination; the noble Lord raised some specific examples. Despite leaving the European Union, we will of course continue to work with our friends in Europe to ensure that these girls and women are kept safe.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, I co-chair the APPG on Nutrition for Growth. As my noble friend will be aware, malnutrition adversely affects young girls, children and women. Will she assure me that the upcoming Tokyo summit will be funded and that we will continue our leadership role in this key area?

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, the UK is a leading player in global health and nutrition forms a big part of that. We recently had debates on its importance. We continue to support the Government of Japan in organising the Tokyo summit and we will play a leading role in it.

Tokyo Nutrition for Growth Summit

Baroness Manzoor Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Collins, for securing this timely and important debate. As the House is aware, we have spoken about nutrition on two recent occasions in this Chamber. The first was in the context of taking an integrated approach to UK foreign policy and development; the second was about weaving nutrition across DfID’s portfolio. I will continue on that theme, but it is the intersectional and foundational nature of nutrition that makes it so important.

I will start by talking about Gavi, the vaccine alliance, which is hosting its replenishment conference in London in June this year. Gavi aims to raise $7.4 billion from international donors to immunise an additional 300 million people between 2021 and 2025, saving up to 8 million lives. UK civil society organisations are calling for Her Majesty’s Government to retain or increase their share of Gavi funding, which is roughly 25%. I support that ask. Ensuring full coverage of all WHO-recommended vaccines will make the world a safer and more prosperous place.

However, if the UK is to spend such a large amount of money on vaccinations, it is only right that steps are taken to ensure that investment is as impactful as possible. It is well known that malnutrition reduces the efficacy of vaccines. While some vaccines may still work on a malnourished child, the timing, quality and duration of responses may be impaired. Likewise, malnutrition is often caused by vaccine-preventable diseases; additionally, malnourished people are far more likely to die from these. In short, vaccinations and nutrition are two sides of the same coin.

To accelerate action on ending preventable deaths and improving people’s health and economic prospects, the Government must invest ambitiously in Gavi, but also at N4G. In addition, they should take steps to align their objectives in both areas and across health more broadly. On that point, what steps is my noble friend the Minister taking to ensure that ready-to-use, therapeutic foods and other nutrition services are included in DfID’s wider efforts to build effective health systems? What consideration will her department’s N4G pledge give to the strategy of Gavi and other health multilaterals, in order to align objectives?

My second point covers aid and trade. Too often, a country’s ability to feed its population with a healthy diet is hindered because its fruit and vegetables are too expensive for most of the population, or are exported to wealthier nations. Conversely, companies from a range of countries, including the UK, are able to flood local markets with cheap, high-sugar foods. For example, it is worth noting that the CEO of Associated British Foods was present at the UK-Africa Investment Summit last week. ABF owns the largest sugar producer in Africa, which recently received a DfID grant to implement its land rights policies. While I am wholly supportive of that work, I urge that further DfID funding should improve employment and market conditions for locally owned companies, growing food that contributes to a healthy, diverse diet. What consideration will the Minister’s N4G pledge give to private sector engagement and international trading arrangements?

As the noble Lord, Lord Collins, and the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, have said, the promotion of exclusive breastfeeding for six months, continued until 11 months, is the single most effective way to reduce child mortality in countries with high burdens of malnutrition. Near-universal adoption of optimal breastfeeding could prevent 823,000 child deaths and 20,000 maternal breast cancer deaths per year. As well as being extremely high in impact, breastfeeding promotion is very low in cost. Will my noble friend the Minister ensure that the promotion of exclusive breast- feeding is made a priority in the Government’s N4G pledge? Specifically, will she commit, as has already been asked, to working with partners to ensure better enforcement of the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes?

As co-chair of the APPG on Nutrition for Growth, I look forward to a strong commitment from the Government. I appreciate that my noble friend he Minister is to meet APPG members to discuss this further, but what thought has she given to the International Coalition for Advocacy on Nutrition’s request that the Government commit £800 million per year to nutrition between 2021 and 2025? I look forward to hearing about a really ambitious pledge from the Government.

UK Aid: Nutrition-sensitive Programmes

Baroness Manzoor Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, the UK has been a proud global leader on nutrition since hosting the summit in 2013. Since 2015 we have reached more than 60 million women, adolescent girls and young children with nutrition services in 25 countries. The noble Lord is right to point out the advantage of the new OECD policy marker. Indeed, the UK worked with donors and other Governments to develop the guidance for that marker and supported its adoption at the OECD. The new marker gives a big improvement in our ability to track aid spending on nutrition. We are exploring options to ensure that we use that policy marker to its best effect in DfID.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, the Government are doing some excellent work on nutrition and there is a very expert team in DfID. I co-chair the APPG on Nutrition for Growth and, as my noble friend the Minister knows, there is to be a summit in Tokyo later in the year. Will she agree to meet me and other members of the APPG to discuss Her Majesty’s Government’s commitments to the summit?

[Baroness Sugg]

My Lords, I pay tribute to the work of my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Collins, in co-chairing the APPG, an important body. Our current commitments to nutrition will come to an end in 2020, so the Tokyo Nutrition for Growth summit in December will really be a key moment in making sure that progress continues. We have bold ambitions for the summit. We are working closely with the Government of Japan to ensure that it is a success. We are looking to strengthen health systems, to come up with longer-term funding and to ensure that Governments, donors and businesses take positive action to improve access to nutritious and sustainable diets. I would be delighted to come along to the APPG with officials to provide further briefing.