Nutrition in emergency situations - Ready-to-use Supplementary Food (RUSF) and Ready-to-use Therapeutic Food (RUTF)

Expected Outcome:

Ready-to-use Supplementary Food (RUSF) and Ready-to-use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) rely often on imported components while local resources are not exploited A sustainable and healthy food systems approach is needed for corrective action. Research and Innovation will increase the use of locally available sources of protein, micronutrients and fatty acids (plant-, marine-, and other locally available ingredients) in the local production and food processing of RUSF and RUTF, the latter in line with Codex Guidelines CXG 95-2022 in Africa. Identify options that allow for the safe use of new, locally produced, alternative supplementary foods to be certified by WHO and used, based on the health status of the child and the local conditions, as alternatives to the current ‘all RUTF’ approach. An approach that is more and more challenged by the increasing production and transportation costs, lack of access to beneficiaries, mainly in fragile and conflict affected countries and with a large carbon footprint.

The topic follows the Food 2030 approach, in particular its co-benefits on nutrition, climate, circularity and innovation and implements the FNSSA roadmap of the AU-EU research and innovation partnership. It is also part of a humanitarian-development-peace (HDP) nexus action.

Project results are expected to contribute to all the following expected outcomes:

• scaling up locally produced RUSF and RUTF will help improving access to the life saving nutrition products for more children in need;
• sustainable and locally produced RUSF and RUTFs will enable national governments to develop versions of these products that are best suited to the local context, having higher acceptability, and provide the regulatory frameworks to manufacturers for national production in line with the relevant Codex Alimentarius Guidelines, such as CXG 95-2022;
• supporting African countries’ governments in their effort of local production of energy, protein and micronutrient supplements contributing to the objectives of climate change adaptation and mitigation, sustainable and efficient management of natural resources, resilience and disaster risk reduction as well as protection and restoration of biodiversity.

In parallel research could be developed around new safe and efficacious, science based recipes that could complement and replace under specific circumstances, in collaboration with the Nutrition Technical Advisory Board and after the validation by WHO, the exclusive use of RUTF for persons not affected by severe acute malnutrition, while making sure that relevant quality criteria, information practices and use criteria are established (based on the child health status and local circumstances).

Scope:

Research and innovation collaboration between Europe and Africa will help the African countries (health specialists, producers, seed companies, SMEs and food industries) to develop/ scale up the relevant and sustainable local production of RUSF and RUTF or any other types of supplements and related ingredients, using varieties adapted to local climate and agro-ecological conditions, thereby protecting and restoring biodiversity. Thereby contributing to reduce the climate footprint of production and transport in line with the objectives of climate change adaptation and mitigation and sustainable and efficient management of natural resources. Implement the multi-actor approach by involving a wide range of food systems actors and conducting inter-disciplinary research. Link up for clustering to other projects of the AU-EU research and innovation priorities, in particular linked to Food Systems transition projects and the wider range of projects in Food and Nutrition Security and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA), Climate Change and Sustainable Energy (CCSE) and the AU-EU Innovation Union using the network linkages to the CEA-First project and the International Research Consortium on FNSSA.

Innovation: Proposals should foresee a space for mentoring and accelerating innovative business concepts, including social innovation and upscaling in view of African or European food business entrepreneurs and start-ups with special consideration of women and the diaspora using cascading funding opportunities. Proposals should involve financial support to third parties e.g. to academic researchers, health institutes, start-ups, SMEs and other multidisciplinary actors, to, for instance, develop, test or validate developed assessment approaches or collect or prepare data sets or provide other contributions to achieve the project objectives. Consortia need to define the selection process of organisations, for which financial support will be granted. Maximum 20% of the EU funding can be allocated to this purpose. Proposals should involve contributions from the social sciences and humanities (SSH) disciplines.