Food variety, dietary diversity scores and dietary quality of complementary foods consuming by 6-24 months aged children in Jimma town, southwest Ethiopia

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to assess Food Variety Score (FVS), Dietary Diversity Score (DDS) and dietary quality of collected complementary foods consumed in Jimma town, southwest Ethiopia. Design/methodology/approach Multi-stage stratified simple random sampling method was used to identify 384 children who were between 6 to 24 months of age living in Jimma town, Ethiopia. FVS and DDS were assessed based on 24 h recall method. Aliquot of infant’s diet samples were collected from randomly selected 30 household mothers feeding to 6-24 months aged children, and they are combined to get 15 samples by enquiring the ingredients similarly used in preparation. The major nutrients, anti-nutrients were determined with standard procedures. Further, nutrient adequacy and mean adequacy were determined for collected samples. Findings Results showed that mean FVS was 7.14 ± 4.07 (range 0 to 18) and DDS was 3.44 ± 1.75 (range 1 to 8). Consumption of diversified diet among the studied population significantly associated with residence areas of children’s (p = 0.001), age of the care taker (p = 0.001), occupation of care takers (p = 0.001), monthly income (p = 0.001), average money spent on food purchase per month (p = 0.001). Average mean adequacy of macronutrients (crude protein, crude fat and carbohydrate) was observed as 0.81, micronutrient (Fe, Ca, Zn) mean adequacy was 0.49 and Vitamin A adequacy was 0.34 for the complementary foods. All the complementary foods were reported mean adequacy of < 1 for macro and micro nutrients. Originality/value Studies on dietary diversity and dietary quality of the complementary foods were not documented in Jimma town, Ethiopia. The results of this study are highly useful to understand the complementary foods consumption pattern particularly in dietary diversity and food variety. Moreover, results obtained on dietary quality are very useful to recommend further development in complementary food preparations in the study area.

Considerations for development of low-cost supplementary foods for lactating women in India – a review

“…Keeping in view the current problems such as food insecurity, starvation and malnutrition, the need of the hour is to develop low-cost supplementary foods that are easily available, accessible as well as nutritious. Mezgebo et al, (2020) conducted a research to study the variability in consumption patterns of complementary foods among 6-12-monthold children in Jimma town, southwest Ethiopia. Various parameters such as the dietary diversity score, food variety score and dietary quality of different complementary foods were assessed on the basis of a 24-h dietary recall method.…”