Abstract :
Background: India alone is responsible for one third of the global burden of low birth weight even after excluding 66 per cent of infants in the country who are not weighed at birth. Adequate nutrition during infancy and early childhood is fundamental to the development of each child’s full human potential. Inadequate and inappropriate complementary feeding practices such as untimely introduction (too early or too late) of complementary foods, improper feeding frequency, low dietary diversity and less nutrient dense complementary foods and unhygienic feeding practices can have severe detrimental threats to the health and nutritional status of the children. Objective: The objective of the present review is to assess the current status of complementary feeding practices in India. Methods:Appropriate studies were identified from online databases viz. PubMed, Google Scholar, Medindia, WHOint, Research Gate, UNICEF.org, EMBASE, World Wide Scienceusing appropriate keywords. Results: The status of complementary feeding practices in India remains poor even after the formulation and implementation of various policies and programs. The time of initiation of complementary feeding is either too early or too late. Also, the minimum meal frequency, minimum dietary diversity and minimum acceptable diet is not achieved in majority of the infants aged six months to two years. Conclusion: It can be concluded that the complementary feeding practices in India are not up to the mark and necessary measures needs to be taken to improve this pernicious situation.
Keyword :
Complementary feeding, dietary diversity, infants, minimum acceptable diet, minimum dietary diversity, minimum meal frequency