A fortified mid-day meal gets underway at Karnataka’s govt schools

It’s 6 am and the only sign of activity is smoke from the chimney of the Akshaya Patra kitchen in Hubballi. Drive up the dusty path and it becomes evident it is called a mega kitchen.

Cauldrons of rice and sambar are on the boil in a well-oiled, mechanised, linear kitchen and the smell wafts across the floor.

This kitchen is among the first in the country to use fortified rice after the Central government came out with standards for fortified food, in late October.

The kitchen uses Ultra Rice or rice fortified with multiple micro-nutrients, including iron, folic acid and vitamins, and this is supplied to schools under the mid-day meal scheme in Karnataka.

The initiative is the “biggest ever program (of staple food fortification) in terms of reach,” the State points out.

In fact, food fortification is a tool in the Centre’s kitty to tackle micronutrient malnutrition or “hidden hunger” where people are under-nourished due to the chronic lack of vitamins and minerals.

And the word is that more States are keen to adopt similar initiatives.

At the mega kitchen, work begins every day at 3.30 am, says Rajesh Patki with The Akshaya Patra Foundation (TAPF), as the food needs to reach about 800 schools across Dharwad (1.5 lakh children) by noon.

The Ultra Rice is mixed with regular rice in the ratio 1:99, explains Arvind Betigeri, Project Manager (rice fortification) with PATH, the non-profit organisation that initially came up with the technology further developed by US healthcare major Abbott.

The fortified rice is supplied to the kitchen by Usher Agro Ltd. Explaining how it is made, Betigeri says the micro nutrients are added to the rice flour in portions as outlined by the government and the paste is extruded into rice grains.

The addition of fortified rice into the daily meal adds about 10 paisa to a meal priced at ₹7, says Rajiv Lochana Das, President, TAPF (Hubballi). About half that cost is subsidised by the government.

But for the children at SGKGS Narendra Primary Girls School (Dharwad), the piping hot food is something to look forward to, and “palao”, they chorus, is a hot favourite.

Rice is “unforgiving”, says Abbott’s Dan Schmitz, explaining the challenge in packing multiple nutrients into rice grains and not change its texture, colour or odour, besides keeping cost under control.

“It is one of the most difficult foods to fortify,” he says, contrasting it with fortifed milk (with Vitamin A), salt (with iodine), etc.

Schmitz, Abbott’s head of nutrition global product development, says it took three years to develop this optimum rice formulation.

The Abbott team was involved with the rice formulation and manufacture research, checking its 12-18 month shelf life, stability of the rice on heating and maintenance of the dosage even a year later, etc.

Happy at being part of the initial rollout of fortified food, Sushama Godbole, Chief Executive Officer of the Dharwad Zilla Panchayat, says that its impact will be studied in about six months.

Responding to concerns on over-dosing of micro-nutrients through constant consumption, Schmitz explains that the ingredients are added in amounts that mimic the natural diet and is given in quantities in line with the daily requirement.

There is low risk of over fortification, he says, as the body has its own way to deal with these nutrients.

Madhavan Nair, former scientist with the National Institute of Nutrition agrees. The fortification is in line with government standards, he says, adding that any excess would be eliminated by the body.

Pointing out that any staple food can be fortified (wheat, salt etc) depending on the health and nutritional need, Nair further calls for “synergistic food” habits that involve eating a fruit with food to improve the absorption of nutrients into the body.

(The writer was in Hubballi on an invitation from Abbott.)