Authorship, acknowledgements and suggested citation

This report represents the considered input of the Independent Expert Group (IEG) members, who are collectively accountable for the quality and independence of the report. Members participated in a personal capacity, not as representatives of their affiliated organisations. The report does not necessarily represent the position of any of the individuals involved in its development, as listed below, or any of the partnered organisations involved in the development of the Global Nutrition Report.

Editor-in-chief

The publication was produced under the direction and guidance of the IEG Chair, Dr Renata Micha. A team of IEG Members was identified by the IEG Chair as the lead authors of the report, who jointly developed and decided on the outline and content of the report.

The authors produced a number of interim outputs, including an annotated outline, first draft and final draft of the report. These were reviewed, validated and cleared by the IEG Chair at each stage in the preparation process.

Authors

Expert authors

The expert authors accept full responsibility for the published content and have been involved in all aspects of the creation of the content, including research, design, analysis and final presentation of the content.

IEG Members are lead authors on the report and can nominate and invite internationally recognised experts (external experts) as co-authors when the required expertise is not available within the larger IEG, as per the IEG terms of reference. The expert authors (IEG Members, external experts) accept full responsibility for the published content and have been involved in all aspects of the creation of the content including conception, design, writing, research, analysis, interpretation and final presentation of the content. Authors are listed in order of contribution.

Chapter 1 was authored by Dr Mariachiara Di Cesare (IEG lead author), Dr Shibani Ghosh (IEG), Dr Saskia Osendarp (IEG) and Dr Dariush Mozaffarian (IEG).

Chapter 2 was authored by Dr Marco Springmann (IEG lead author), Dr Dariush Mozaffarian (IEG), Dr Cynthia Rosenzweig (IEG) and Dr Renata Micha (IEG).

Chapter 3 was authored by Dr Meera Shekar (IEG lead author), Ruwan de Mel (external expert), Dr Jonathan Akuoku (external expert) and Jordan Beecher (research analyst).

Chapter 4 was authored by Dr Shibani Ghosh (IEG lead author), Dr Mariachiara Di Cesare (IEG) and Dr Dariush Mozaffarian (IEG).

Author disclosures

Mariachiara Di Cesare, Marco Springmann, Meera Shekar, Jonathan Akuoku, Jordan Beecher, Ruwan de Mel, Renata Micha, Saskia Osendarp and Cynthia Rosenzweig have no conflicts of interest.

Shibani Ghosh reports research funding from the United States Agency for International Development. Dr Ghosh is also on the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Safety and on the Scientific Advisory Committee supporting the Committee on Agriculture (COAG), an FAO governing body in undertaking a comprehensive and evidence based global assessment of the contribution of livestock to food security, sustainable food systems, nutrition, and healthy diets; all outside the submitted work.

Dariush Mozaffarian reports research funding from the National Institutes of Health, the Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation; personal fees from Acasti Pharma, Barilla, Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Danone and Motif FoodWorks; scientific advisory board, Beren Therapeutics, Brightseed, Calibrate, DayTwo (ended 6/20), Elysium Health, Filtricine, Foodome, HumanCo, January Inc., Perfect Day, Season and Tiny Organics; stock ownership in Calibrate and HumanCo; and chapter royalties from UpToDate; all outside the submitted work.

Contributors

Box authors

We are grateful to the following experts, who authored the boxes in the report.

Chapter 1: Box 1.1 Saskia Osendarp; Box 1.2 Dariush Mozaffarian.

Chapter 2: Box 2.1 Marco Springmann.

Chapter 3: Box 3.1 The Power of Nutrition team, Palladium Impact Capital and World Bank; Box 3.2 Michelle Mehta, Ali Subandoro and Meera Shekar; Box 3.3 Nick Scott, Jonathan Akuoku, Yi-Kyoung Lee, Davide De Beni, Kyoko Shibata Okamura, Ali Subandoro and Huihui Wang.

Chapter 4: Box 4.1 Shibani Ghosh and Mariachiara Di Cesare.

Writing, research and data analysis

The authors are grateful to the following writers, researchers and data analysts who supported the development of the report by working closely with the IEG Members. These individuals are listed in order of contribution.

Chapter 1: James Bentham, University of Kent (data analysis); Dean Breed, DI (research and data analysis); and Jordan Beecher, DI (research and data analysis).

Chapter 3: Nick Scott, Burnet Institute (research and data analysis); Dean Breed, DI (research and data analysis); Mary D’Alimonte, Results 4 Development (research and data analysis); Yi-Kyoung Lee, World Bank (research and data analysis); Davide De Beni, Consultant (research and data analysis); Meghan O’Hearn, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University (research); Suzannah Gerber, Tufts Medical Center, Tufts University School of Medicine (research); Sylara Marie Cruz, Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Tufts University (research); and Dariush Mozaffarian, Tufts Medical Center, Tufts University School of Medicine (research).

Chapter 4: Sally Priest (analysis of alignment of global nutrition targets), Kamal Kasturi (data management and analysis, N4G tracker 2020), William Knechtel (data management, N4G tracker 2021) and Winnie Mughogho (N4G tracker 2021).

Independent Expert Group (IEG) review and input

The authors would like to thank the IEG Members for providing valuable advice and feedback according to their areas of expertise. The entire IEG has been consulted throughout this process, including review of the final draft, to provide critical input and advice. Feedback was provided by Bridget Fenn, Saskia Osendarp, Daniel Hoffman, Eileen Kennedy, Jacqueline Kung’u, Shuhei Nomura, Giacomo Zanello and Stanley Zlotkin.

Stakeholder Group (SG) input

The authors would like to thank the SG Members for their support in commissioning and developing the report, and for their strategic leadership in building support for the report.

Other stakeholders and organisations

The authors are grateful to the following individuals for providing data.

Chapter 1: Elisa Dominguez, Chika Hayashi, Julia Krasevec, Richard Kumapley and Vrinda Mehra, UNICEF, US; Elaine Borghi and Lisa Rogers, WHO, Switzerland; Bin Zhou, Imperial College London, UK; and James Bentham, University of Kent, UK.

Chapter 3: Augustin Flory, Results 4 Development; Dr Milan Thomas, Georgetown University, US; and William Knechtel, SUN.

The authors are also grateful to all the stakeholders who reported on the progress they have made towards their nutrition commitments (Chapter 4).

Production and communications support

The team at Development Initiatives worked closely with Dr Renata Micha, and in support of the wider Independent Expert Group, to bring this year’s report to life. The report was project managed by Alex Key. Support with data analysis and data science was provided by Natalie Evans and Alex Miller respectively. Communications were managed by Anna Hope, supported by Montse Encontra. Charlotte Martineau and Amy Cox managed outreach and engagement. Simon Murphy and Georgina Carver managed production of the report, supported by Alice McAndrew. Additional communications advice on the report’s messaging and design was provided by Portland Communications. Editing was done by Nina Behrman, and design by Definite.design and Soapbox.

Funding sources

The 2021 Global Nutrition Report was supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (Canada), the European Commission, Germany’s Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Irish Aid and the US Agency for International Development (USAID). The funders did not contribute to: the design or conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis or interpretation of the data; preparation, review or approval of the report; or decision to publish the report.

Copyright 2021: Development Initiatives Poverty Research Ltd.

Suggested citation: 2021 Global Nutrition Report: The state of global nutrition. Bristol, UK: Development Initiatives.

Disclaimer: Any opinions stated herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily representative of or endorsed by Development Initiatives Poverty Research Ltd or any of the partner organisations involved in the 2021 Global Nutrition Report. Not all Independent Expert Group members will necessarily agree with every word in the report. The boundaries and names used do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by Development Initiatives Poverty Research Ltd.