SCN News No 36 - UNSCN

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WORKING GROUPS
www.unsystem.org/scn
WORKING GROUP ON NUTRITION, ETHICS AND HUMAN RIGHTS
Chair: Margret Vidar (FAO), Co-Chairs: Asako Hattori (OHCHR), Marlis Lindecke (GTZ), Flavio Valente (FIAN), Rapporteur: Marc Cohen (IFPRI)
Topics discussed
Lancet Nutrition Series
Discrimination and Undernutrition
Updates from four Task Forces
Indigenous People
International Dimensions
Corporate Food Sector
Capacity Development
Defining Fundamental Right to be
Free from Hunger
Book launch 4 March: Global Obligations
for the Right to Food (p.78)
Recommendations to SCN
1. For future SCN Sessions, to
extend invitation to WGNEHR presession
meeting
2. Efforts to review SCN in the
context of an overall assessment of
the international nutrition system
should be carried out in a
transparent manner; recognize the
core role of SCN in harmonizing
the efforts of UN agencies in the
field of nutrition, with the advice of
bilateral partners and civil society;
and acknowledge the prominent
place of human rights on the
agenda of the United Nations and
in the vision and mission of SCN.
3. SCN should continue to focus on
economic, social, political and
cultural factors as causes of
malnutrition
4. Other SCN Working Groups should
pursue their particular focus within
a human rights perspective
Planned activities
(extract from 2008 Work Plan)
1. Monitor developments on global
obligations for the right to food
2. Continue Task Forces’ work
3. Explore activities to address the
human rights implications of readyto-use
therapeutic foods
For more details, please see Working
Group report, presentations and
background documents
SCN NEWS # 36 back to contents
Highlights from discussions 2 and 4 March
Updates and work plans from the Task Forces
• TF on the Human Rights Responsibilities of the Corporate Food Sector will
focus on regulation of industry marketing practices, especially as regards
pressure on children, and may change its name accordingly. A legal expert
will be invited to serve as vice-coordinator.
• TF on the Capacity Development for Human Rights in Nutrition will continue
to bring a human rights perspective to nutrition meetings, take part in
training initiatives, and assist in the development of curricula on the linkages
between food/nutrition and human rights.
• TF on Indigenous Peoples and the Right to Adequate Food will complete its
study of this topic and present it, together with policy recommendations, at
the IUNS meeting. The 36 th Session of the SCN will receive an update.
• TF on the Fundamental Right of Everyone to be Free from Hunger will
continue efforts to clarify the content of this right.
Discrimination and undernutrition. Veena Shatrugna (India National Institute
of Nutrition) presented data from India, demonstrating the role of cultural
factors for good nutrition.
Recommendations on the Global Obligations for the Right to Food,
available from WG-NEHR webpage based on the book by the Task Force,
concern starting a process towards clarifying international or extraterritorial
obligations under the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of
States’ Parties as well as for international agencies and NGOs in relation to
food and nutrition. The UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
(CESCR) should prepare a General Comment on this theme, taking into
account ongoing work in the Human Rights Council and other relevant bodies.
Future General Comment should contain guidelines for international or
extraterritorial obligations.
Comments to the Lancet Nutrition Series: The WG welcomed attention to
the serious problem of maternal and child undernutrition in developing countries
in such a prestigious health sciences journal. The WG appreciated in particular
the call for research into the accountability and responses of governments
to their nutrition-relevant commitments under international conventions
such as the un convention on the rights of the child and the convention on the
elimination of all forms of discrimination against women. However, the WG
also had a number of concerns about the series as a whole, including:
• It tends to take a top-down approach to issues, focusing on getting the
interventions right, and frequently views malnourished people as clients and
beneficiaries, rather than human beings with rights who are key actors in
achieving their own development. Instead, it tends to re-medicalize
discussion on nutrition and miss out on the important role and contribution
of policy and legal frameworks, including those on human rights in nutrition.
• It tends to neglect the important role that the U.N. system has played and
must continue to play in overcoming undernutrition.
• The series seems to blame the nutrition community for the persistence of
undernutrition, while it neglects social, political, economic, and cultural
determinants of malnutrition.
See also: SCN Working Groups on Nutrition, Ethics and Human Rights and on
Nutrition Throughout the Life Cycle. Human Right of Children and Adolescents
to Adequate Food and to be Free from Obesity and Related Diseases: The
Responsibilities of Food and Beverage Corporations and Related Media and
Marketing Industries. Joint Statement, 33 rd SCN Session, Geneva, 2006.