BASSETERRE, St. Kitts – WITH several islands in the region still recovering from the devastation left by Hurricanes Irma and Maria, questions have been raised on the region’s food security.
This comes as donor agencies, which are providing support to Dominica and other affected islands, are calling for non-perishable food items. But the question of long term health consequence resulting from the use of those food items have arisen.
With the region already grappling with a growing problem of non-communicable diseases – which has caught the attention of regional governments - concerns are being raised about the consequences of the dependency on package foods going to Dominica as well as the region’s food security.
Assistant Administrator at the St. Kitts Red Cross, Natalie Fough raised concerns over the lack of food security and the health implications from processed food items that are shipped after the storms would have passed.
A guest on WINN FM’s ‘Voices’ programme today (Oct. 18), Fough explained that one of things that occurred after disasters, based on her experience working in Dominica, is that there is an attempt by the international and regional communities to send supplies to the affected countries.
However, there is a problem with the quality of supplies that are being sent to those islands. She revealed that there “is a lot of processed foods” with a lot of high carbohydrates.
“….a lot of things actually in the medium to longer term may actually add to the health issues to the country. We also get a lot of bottled water which has sodium, and one of the things we noted after Hurricane Erika in Dominica is that we saw increases in diabetes issues as well as hypertension.”
That disclosure came as the topic was discussed during the 2017 Heads of Government Conference in Grenada, where a number of recommendations were put forward, including passing legislation to curb sugar and processed foods and smoking in public places.
Fough stressed that though in the short term there is a need for food and other supplies, there is also the necessity to source more fresh food from islands that were not affected so there would not be a dependence on process or packaged supplies.
St. Kitts and Nevis is one of the islands that continue to be impacted by the growing problem of NCD, including hypertension and heart disease.
