African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) and Access to Nutrition Initiative (ATNI) today announce the signing of a landmark MoU for the period of 2024-2026.
This strategic partnership is a significant step towards working together to address critical nutritional challenges across the African continent. The MoU solidifies a strong commitment from both ATNI and APHRC to build on existing accountability mechanisms, avoid duplication of effort, and ensure that engagement between both organizations and food and beverage companies is as efficient and streamlined as possible.
Both organizations recognize that malnutrition—including undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies, and obesity—poses significant barriers to economic and social development. By combining ATNI’s expertise in evaluating and improving the nutrition-related practices of food and beverage companies with APHRC’s deep insights into demographic trends and health challenges specific to African communities, the partnership aims to enhance research methodologies, tailor nutritional interventions, and influence policy at both local and international levels.
Under the MoU, APHRC will spearhead several initiatives within its Nutrition and Food Systems (NFS) workstream to promote positive food systems transformation. This will complement ATNI’s East African Market Assessment (EAMA) project, which aims to engage governments, the private sector, and investors in Kenya and Tanzania to improve the state of packaged foods, address micronutrient deficiencies, and enhance food fortification supply chains.
Dr. Catherine Kyobutungi, APHRC’s Executive Director, has the following reflections on this partnership:
“This partnership with ATNI represents a powerful alliance that will transform food systems and promote nutrition equity in Eastern Africa and beyond. By combining our research expertise with ATNI’s industry insights, we can develop more effective, evidence-based interventions and policies to tackle the diverse nutritional challenges our communities face.”
Mr. Greg S Garrett, Executive Director of ATNI noted that:
“Malnutrition trends globally and in East Africa are concerning. The good news is that we know what the solutions are and how to shape markets towards healthier food environments. With these in hand, we are very excited to work with APHRC and provide support to tackle nutrition challenges in the Eastern African region. “
About ATNI
ATNI is a non-profit founded in 2013 that exists for the sole purpose of transforming markets for sustainable nutrition. ATNI believes the private sector has an important role to play in fighting malnutrition.
ATNI’s mission is to improve market performance by challenging key actors in the food system – notably industry and investors – to accelerate access to affordable, sustainable, and nutritious food for all, especially for society’s most vulnerable. ATNI does this through the development and publication of accountability tools and strategies in close collaboration with industry, investors, policymakers, consumers’ organizations and other nutrition stakeholders.
About APHRC
The African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) is the continent’s premier research-to-policy institution, exploring questions of population health and development. The Center’s research is led by a growing cadre of research scientists from across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), driven by the belief that Africa and African-generated evidence must be at the forefront of decisions supporting health and development in Africa. Over the last 21 years, the Center’s reputation has become synonymous with research rigor, leadership, and influence. It is the Centers’ belief that robust and replicable evidence generated by African researchers will drive the continent’s policy agenda to resolve some of the most critical development issues of our time.