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Chapter 20 - Benefits and Costs of the Food and Nutrition Targets for the Post-2015 Development Agenda

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 May 2018

Bjorn Lomborg
Affiliation:
Copenhagen Business School
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Summary

Nutrition has always been a key development indicator. Good nutrition allows for healthy growth and development of children, and inadequate nutrition is a major contributing factor to child mortality. Good nutrition is also important for cognitive development, and hence educational success, both of which are important determinants of labour productivity and hence economic growth. Good nutrition also implies balance – neither undernutrition nor overnutrition. In what follows we will first briefly review the evolution of nutrition goals, from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to 2015, to the World Health Organization targets to 2025, and the proposed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to 2030. We then comment briefly on the proposed SDG for nutrition, and provide an economic perspective on the goal (using Hoddinott et al, 2013), suggesting that the benefit:cost ratio of nutrition investments is very attractive.
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Chapter
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Prioritizing Development
A Cost Benefit Analysis of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals
, pp. 367 - 374
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2018

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