Planning and Development Research

Executive Summary The Cost of the Diet assessment in Sylhet and Moulvibazar districts in 2018 was conducted to estimate the potential contribution of Suchana programme interventions on household food affordability. This analysis aimed at assessing the degree to which economic constraints might affect poor and very poor households in Sylhet division in North-East Bangladesh (i.e. Suchana beneficiary households in Sylhet and Moulvibazar districts) from accessing a nutritious diet. The Cost of the Diet (CotD) method and software was developed by Save the Children, and the analysis can estimate the hypothetical minimum amount of money a typical household would need to purchase their recommended intakes of energy, protein, fat and micronutrients, using locally available foods. Specifically, this assessment set out to answer the following questions: ▪ What is the minimum cost of a nutritionally adequate and culturally acceptable diet for typical households in Sylhet division? ▪ What locally

  Suchana: Ending the Cycle of Undernutrition in Bangladesh        I. INTRODUCTION SUCHANA: Ending the cycle of undernutrition in Bangladesh” is a multi-sectoral nutrition programme aims to achieve a significant reduction in stunting amongst children under two years of age in Bangladesh by catalysing support across government and other stakeholders. The programme adopts an integrated approach to nutrition specific and nutrition sensitive intervention to prevent chronic malnutrition within the critical 1,000 days from conception until a child reaches its second birthday. Suchana Context & Rationale Within Bangladesh, although the prevalence of stunting (shortness in stature compared to child’s age) has declined from 51% in 2004 to 36% of children under five in 20141, levels of stunting remain well above WHO and government thresholds. Some six million children are estimated to be chronically malnourished, and uptake of key infant and young child feeding (IYCF) practices rem

1.1 Background of the study: While the world is moving towards for persuading better society and better living environments, then the people of this country are still fighting for their basic needs, health care facility is one of them. According to WHO, “health means the condition of complete physical mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (physical and mental health).Nutrition means the process by which living things receive the food necessary for them to grow and be healthy and malnourishment refers to lack of deficiency of particular nutrients, like proteins, vitamins and minerals.   During the last few decades, although significant improvements have been made in the health sector, yet less than 40 percent of the population have access to modern and affordable primary health care facilities and in rural area the situation is more worse. For the low level of awareness and education they are not aware about the nutrition and health ca