“Smart Snacks for Adolescents to Address Malnutrition” An Inclusive Business Model to Address Adolescents Nutrition in Bangladesh

The adolescent population in Bangladesh is almost one third of total population which is around 33 million. A large portion of these adolescents are school going who used to avail street foods on regular basis. In recent days, adolescents are tending to avail more street foods which are very much unhygienic, poor food quality as well as unhealthy. The government can facilitate support in the value chain to ensure the product is cost affordable for all the adolescents through different incentives & supports. These snack items will be manufactured under a standard guideline, quality and nutrient enriched for adolescents.

As commercial product, these also has to be tasty, attractive in package and most importantly extensive communication i.e. advertisements. To meet the increasing demand of safe and nutritious snacks for adolescents in Bangladesh, B-Lab (An incubation platform of BIID) is launching a Smart Snack initiative. These foods are highly nutritious, tasty and readily available for processing. Let the “Smart Snacks” become the game changer to address the nutritional challenges exist in the field of adolescent nutrition.

BIID jointly with partners is organizing the 2nd Independent Summit Dialogue titled “Smart Snacks for Adolescents: An Inclusive Business Model to Address Adolescents Nutrition in Bangladesh” on June 16, 2021 over Zoom at 11 am – 1 PM (Dhaka Time) & 6 AM – 8 AM (GMT).

Primary objective of the dialogue is to build a strategic framework and identify the key stakeholders to stimulate and support “Smart Snacks” as an inclusive business model. The secondary objectives is to understand adolescent perspectives (demand), challenges, scopes of regulatory support & incentivize, private sector engagement (supply) perspectives.

All relevant stakeholders including adolescents, private sectors (entrepreneurs, business associations), service providers and policy makers (regulators) are invited in the dialogue. 

The 2 hour’s session  have 3 components, 1st 30 minutes is for briefing and opening remarks, next 45 minutes is a breakout session (3 Groups – Businesses, Adolescents, and Regulators) with specific agenda led by Facilitators and final 45 minutes is for group presentations, feedback and way forward.