Skip to main content
European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations
News article8 December 2021Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO)

€4.3 billion Team Europe commitment to fight the global malnutrition crisis

As the Nutrition for Growth Summit in Tokyo draws to a close today, Team Europe has made a bold commitment to fighting the global malnutrition crisis.

At a center for malnourished children run by EU’s partner World Foof Programme (WFP), children and their mothers learn how to prepare a fortified porridge.
European Union,2019 photographer: Peter Biro

Taken together, the Team Europe commitments amount to at least €4.3 billion.

  • The European Commission has pledged €2.5 billion for the period 2021-2024. The EU will fund development and humanitarian actions in nutrition-relevant sectors including food assistance, agriculture, water, sanitation and hygiene, social protection, health, and education. The aim is to  improve nutrition outcomes with focus on women, girls, adolescents  and children under 5.
  • Denmark has pledged €28.3 million per year until the end of 2022. In addition, Denmark have also launched new National Dietary Guidelines - good for health and climate - and will host the 2022 World Food Summit.   
  • Finland has committed to spend €20 million on nutrition in the next 3 years (2022-2024) by supporting the implementation of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)’s Nutrition Action Plan through the core contribution to IFAD12. Finland will also support the school meals coalition.
  • France announced the hosting of the next Nutrition for Growth Summit in 2024. In addition, France has committed to devote half of its food assistance funding and 25% of the French Muskoka Fund to nutrition by 2024. France also committed to reach by 2024 15% of AFD’s commitments in the fields of water, sanitation and hygiene, health and agriculture. The country will contribute to nutrition in 8 priority countries. France also reaffirmed its support to the recently-launched School Meals Coalition led by the World Food Programme (WFP).
  • Germany has committed to spend €580 million in the field of nutrition for the period  2022-2025. This amount will include support to the Rome-based agencies and nutrition-related bilateral programmes. This does not exclude further commitments at a later stage.
  • Ireland will spend €800 million over the next 5 years on nutrition programmes and interventions. Equating to €160 million a year, this will include funding to multilateral organisations, country based NGOs, recipient governments and international NGOs. It will also include a focus on tacking wasting for 0-6 months children and providing technical and financial assistance for food systems transformation.
  • Netherlands has announced a pledge of €400 million until 2030. This pledge is part of the food security budget and will help 32 million women and young children gain access to healthy diets all year round. Funding of humanitarian assistance and general  contributions to multilateral organisations supporting improvement of food systems are not included in this pledge.
  • Slovenia decided to pledge its €120,000 contribution through the WFP for emergency assistance to the affected population in Madagascar.

Background

The Summit takes place as COVID-19 risks reversing years of progress and deepen the existing hunger and malnutrition crisis — with just four years remaining to achieve the World Health Assembly global nutrition targets and nine years left to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Malnutrition triggered by COVID is now expected to cause 168,000 more deaths among children under five, leave 9.3 million more wasted and 2.6 million more stunted, and make 2.1 million more women anemic by the end of 2022. Therefore commitments made at the Tokyo Summit take place at a critical moment of the global malnutrition crisis and this follows the outcome of the UN Food Systems Summit and Glasgow COP.

Nutrition needs to be tackled at the cross roads of agriculture, health and education, environment and climate change-in a cross cutting-systems approach.

This Team Europe announcement is a major contribution to the outcomes of the Summit. The results of the Summit will be enshrined in a global compact that will serve as a global agreement on international and multi-stakeholder commitments to nutrition. It will summarise the combined ambition of all stakeholders to reach specific, time-bound nutrition targets.

Picture: European Union, 2019 (photographer: Peter Biro)

Related pages