President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. stressed the need to resolve the country's nutritional problems, saying it is critical in achieving socioeconomic development.

Marcos underscored at the the national launch of the Philippine Multi-sectoral Nutrition Project (PMNP) at the Manila Hotel on Wednesday, March 29.

In his speech, the President raised concern about a National Nutrition Survey (ENNS) that showed a high incidence of stunting and other health issues among Filipino children. He likewise lamented the "insidiousness" of malnutrition in the country.

Marcos said these must be solved if the government wanted its food security agenda to be effective and complete.

"Malnutrition is, in turn, linked to long-term adverse developmental impacts, taking its toll on our people's learning ability, academic performance, all the way to productivity and employment opportunities—and it also carries with it hereditary implications," he said.

"Like the problem of food security, these related nutritional issues are also critical and fundamental to our socioeconomic development," he added.

"As we aim for food security, we must also pursue with the same vigor and consistency the remedies to this grave problem of [malnutrition]. Whatever solutions we adopt in these two areas, they must be strategically related and mutually reinforcing," he continued.

The 2021 EMNS results broke down the prevalence of malnutrition among infants and young children:

• Underweight: 12.3 percent (medium)
• Stunting: 21.6 percent (high)
• Wasting: 7.2 percent (medium)
• Overweight-for-height: 3.6 percent

To address the issue, President Marcos said the PMNP focuses on aiding local government units (LGUs) most in need of intervention. This would be in the form of primary healthcare support and nutrition services, including Early Childhood Care and Development (ECCD) services, access to clean water and sanitation, technical information, and training and financing, among others.

"This, I think, demonstrates the multi-faceted nature of the problem and the multi-faceted nature of whatever solutions we will apply to that problem," he said.

Marcos, citing the World Bank, added that investing in nutrition promises the highest returns, making it one of the best value-for-money development actions.

"Hence, we must be serious in its pursuit, in the same way that we do our other administration priorities," he said.

"This program will involve and improve a lot of our people across the board, especially those who we put in the poor and marginalized category," he added.

This year's PMNP launch focuses on the theme, "Sa Healthy Pilipinas, Lahat Malakas! Converging Governance and Empowering Communities Against Maternal and Child Malnutrition." It gathers stakeholders and government officials to tackle key health issues, particularly maternal and child healthcare discussions.

According to the Department of Health (DOH), the goals of the said project are to achieve critical impacts on the health and nutrition of every Filipino child and strengthen the LGUs' capacities in primary healthcare delivery of maternal and child health services.