Volume 1

First report / Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire.

  • Great Britain. Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire.
Date:
1939
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: First report / Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    234/382 (page 8)
    capacity to the Government. Committees deal with individual problems such as questions affecting the economics and market- ing of agricultural produce. Education and propaganda are conducted. An agricultural supplement to the Official Gazette is published monthly in which the results of local experiment and research are brought to the notice of the public. Talks in Arabic and Hebrew are a regular weekly feature of the local broadcast programmes. The monthly expenditure of an average urban family of 4-2 man units on 20 staple food commodities (including fuel) is approximately £P.5. This estimate does not, however, apply to lower Arab labouring classes whose expenditure is probably much less as the total monthly earnings of an unskilled labourer approximate £P.3-£P.4. There has been a very considerable reduction in the retail cost of certain valuable food commodities in the last 18 years as gauged by published statistics, e.g. fresh milk, mutton, potatoes and rice 50 per cent., eggs and fish 4o per cent., butter 30 per cent., beef 25 per cent. A full third class Arab diet in Government hospitals, including extras, costs approximately 40 mils* per diem, and the very complete prison diet (hard labour), 3,200 available calories including all essen- tials, averages 22 mils per diem at present contract prices. 5. Researches and Surveys.—The only surveys hitherto undertaken are those of Kligler and of MacLennan summarised above. With regard to the improvement of nutrition, the local authorities conclude that little of importance can be achieved until a comprehensive scientific investigation has been made into the whole position. 6. Practical Measures for Inuprovement of Nutrition.—Refer- ence has been made in paragraph 4 to the work undertaken by the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries for the improve- ment of local produce in quality and quantity, and of animal husbandry. Instruction and education are necessary to produce a proper appreciation of the value and importance of diets. The infant welfare services of the country are performing valuable work in this direction. The Jewish community is particularly well served by Jewish organisations, but there is room for considerable ex- pansion of this work amongst Arabs. There are 37 Jewish infant welfare centres for a population of 386,084; and 36 Government and three private centres which attend to the infants of the rest of the population numbering 930,683. At all centres attention is given to instruction of mothers in the diet of infants and children. In the education of elder girls and teachers the Department of Education lays stress on domestic science, and there is an annual competition open to Government schools for * 1,000 mils = {P.1 = one pound sterling.