Folic acid helps prevent life-altering birth defects.
Ensuring that women have access to folic acid through supplementation and fortification protects them from anaemia and protects their babies from neural tube defects, should they become pregnant.
Not having enough folate is among the most common micronutrient deficiencies, with devastating yet preventable impacts.
Pregnant women are at higher risk for folate insufficiency throughout their childbearing years, which means their babies may be born with neural tube defects such as spina bifida or anencephaly. Folic acid deficiency can lead to mental confusion and depression, diarrhoea, or megaloblastic anaemia.
Enriching staple foods with folic acid gets this micronutrient to those who need it most.
Nutrition International helps flour and cooking oil producers fortify their products with folic acid and other micronutrients, and assists governments to draft legislation to make it mandatory to fortify wheat flour with folic acid and iron.
We work with governments, NGOs, and the private sector to ensure that folic acid supplements are part of intervention packages delivered through routine health services to women.
We ensure that adolescent girls and pregnant women have access to folic acid by:
Discover our projects around the world
Find Nutrition International folic acid projects.
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