Grocott's Mail
    Facebook Twitter Instagram
    Saturday, May 17
    Facebook Twitter Instagram
    Grocott's Mail
    • NEWS
      • Courts & Crime
      • Features
      • Politics
      • People
      • Health & Well-being
    • SPORT
      • News
      • Results
      • Sports Diary
      • Club Contacts
      • Columns
      • Sport Galleries
      • Sport Videos
    • OPINION
      • Election Connection
      • Makana Voices
      • Deur ‘n Gekleurde Bril
      • Newtown… Old Eyes
      • Incisive View
      • Your Say
    • ARTSLIFE
      • Cue
        • Cue Archives
      • Makana Sharp!
      • Visual Art
      • Literature
      • Food
      • Festivals
      • Community Arts
      • Going Places
    • OUR TOWN
      • What’s on
      • Spiritual
      • Emergency & Well-being
      • Covid-19
      • Safety
      • Civic
      • Municipality
      • Weather
      • Properties
        • Grahamstown Properties
      • Your Town, Our Town
    • OUTSIDE
      • Enviro News
      • Gardening
      • Farming
      • Science
      • Conservation
      • Motoring
      • Pets/Animals
    • ECONOMIX
      • Business News
      • Entrepreneurship
      • Personal Finance
    • EDUCATION
      • Education NEWS
      • Education OUR TOWN
      • Education INFO
    • EDITORIAL
    Grocott's Mail
    You are at:Home»Uncategorized»Nutrition for education
    Uncategorized

    Nutrition for education

    Busisiwe HohoBy Busisiwe HohoJanuary 25, 2010No Comments3 Mins Read
    Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email

    If children don’t eat properly, they cannot learn properly. Anyone who has tried to study for exams on an empty stomach can attest to this. If we conducted a survey with local food outlets they would probably confirm that they do more business over the exam periods than at most other times during the year.

    If children don’t eat properly, they cannot learn properly. Anyone who has tried to study for exams on an empty stomach can attest to this. If we conducted a survey with local food outlets they would probably confirm that they do more business over the exam periods than at most other times during the year.

    Eating properly however, does not simply mean having a full belly. It has a lot more to do with having a nutritionally balanced diet, particularly in a child’s earliest years.

    If a child does not eat balanced meals in its first few years, it can suffer the consequences for the rest of its life.

    As the SciDev.Net website article on Improving early childhood nutrition says, “Undernutrition
    can delay brain development, impair academic performance and reduce productivity in later life”.
    For these very reasons the government should be giving child nutrition programmes its highest priority.

    It is almost universally accepted that breastfeeding is the optimal form of nutrition in the first few months of a child’s life, therefore society should encourage breastfeeding wherever and whenever possible.

    However, our society is not doing enough to ensure that children eat balanced meals in those critical years immediately after babies have been weaned.

    Vast numbers of children in this country who are under ten years of age now will be at a significant disadvantage in later life because they do not eat a balanced diet.

    The many different reasons for this tragic state of affairs can be summed up under two over-reaching observations: firstly, impoverished sections of our population do not have enough money to provide nutritious food for their children and secondly, parents are not aware of the importance and methods of ensuring that their children are properly fed.

    Society as a whole, and government in particular, should give the highest priority to addressing these issues.

    The government under Thabo Mbeki made a lot of noise about poverty alleviation because it recognised how important it was as the root cause of the many of the problems in this country.

    Sadly this did not contribute much to actual poverty alleviation. Government has not done nearly enough in terms of poverty alleviation or nutrition awareness programmes to ensure that all children in this country are eating nutritionally balanced meals.

    Previous ArticleCatch night bowls three nights a week
    Next Article Night bowls begins-with much enjoyment
    Busisiwe Hoho

      Comments are closed.

      Code of Ethics and Conduct
      GROCOTT’S SUBSCRIPTION
      RMR
      Listen to RMR


      Humans of Makhanda

      Humans of Makhanda

      Weather    |     About     |     Advertise     |     Subscribe     |     Contact     |     Support Grocott’s Mail

      © 2025 Maintained by School of Journalism & Media Studies.

      Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.