The Meriem pilot project – Mobilising Sahelian businesses for large-scale innovative responses to malnutrition, is a pilot project that aims to develop commercial solutions to prevent malnutrition.
It intends to demonstrate how, and in which conditions, commercial solutions can contribute to preventing malnutrition over the long term. Marketing innovations will be tested and rolled out with high-potential Sahelian businesses, selected for the dual benefit of entering a buoyant market while at the same time contributing to address a public health issue. These innovations are accompanied by essential actions supporting the public sector to implement an appropriate regulatory framework (quality standards, WHO International Code, etc.) and promote a quality label, making it possible to encourage businesses to become mobilised while regulating their action. This approach is combined with actions to raise awareness on exclusive breastfeeding, food diversification and the benefits of continuing to breastfeed until the age of two or older. The actions are conducted in relation with public health actors in order to encourage these fundamental good feeding practices during the first 1,000 days.
In Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, 21 to 42% of children under the age of five suffer from chronic malnutrition, resulting in irreversible consequences in adulthood. Quality manufactured fortified foods have strong potential to prevent malnutrition in young children and their mothers, because they provide nutritional value that is suited to their needs. This is even truer in large Sahelian cities, where residents are used to eating manufactured foods and where the population in precarious neighbourhoods is constantly increasing.
Yet, Sahelian businesses still have difficulties producing and distributing quality fortified foods, in a market they consider complex and unfavourable. A local offer exists, but it is insufficient to meet the population’s needs over the long term, and imported products are unaffordable for the majority of the population. By generating commitment among public and private nutrition actors, and with sustainable market mechanisms, it is possible to extend the affordable, quality fortified foods offer in the Sahel to the widest possible audience, to contribute to preventing malnutrition.
The Meriem pilot project – Mobilising Sahelian businesses for large-scale innovative responses to malnutrition, aims to develop commercial solutions that are replicable on a large scale, to prevent malnutrition.
This project is rising to the challenge of reconciling social objectives and economic profitability on a large scale in three countries: Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. It intends to demonstrate how, and in which conditions, commercial solutions can contribute to sustainably preventing malnutrition. Marketing innovations will be tested and rolled out with high-potential Sahelian businesses, selected for the dual benefit of entering a buoyant market, while contributing to address a public health issue. These innovations are accompanied by essential actions supporting the public sector to implement an appropriate regulatory framework (quality standards, WHO International Code, etc.) and promote a quality label, making it possible to encourage businesses to become mobilised while regulating their action. This approach is combined with actions to raise awareness on exclusive breastfeeding, food diversification and the benefits of continuing to breastfeed until the age of two or older. The actions are conducted in relation with public health actors, in order to encourage these fundamental good feeding practices during the first 1,000 days.
The Meriem project brings together a pool of international experts working in NGOs, research, and private sector consulting – GRET, Hystra, Iram, ICI, IRD, Ogilvy Change, ThinkPlace – with three years of support from Agence française de développement and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (2018-2021).
Expected results:
