Nutrition sensitive value chains: Theory, progress, and open questions

The second Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) challenges the world to achieve food security and improve nutrition by 2030 but food insecurity and micronutrient deficiencies remain stubbornly high and rates of overweight and obesity are rising throughout the world. To attain SDG 2, food systems must deliver more nutritious food to populations. For food systems to do so, value chains for micronutrient-rich foods must be improved, making such foods more available and affordable to consumers. In this paper, we take a consumer focus on the value chains to consider the types of interventions that could lead to improved intakes of micronutrient-rich foods, and review the present literature on the types of value chain assessments, interventions, and initiatives that are attempting to improve nutrition as well as potential future directions.