Skip to main content
Knowledge4Policy
Knowledge for policy

Supporting policy with scientific evidence

We mobilise people and resources to create, curate, make sense of and use knowledge to inform policymaking across Europe.

  • Publication | 2021

Levels and trends in child malnutrition - Key findings of the 2021 edition

Global Food and Nutrition Security

Child malnutrition estimates for the indicators stunting, wasting, overweight and underweight describe the magnitude and patterns of under- and overnutrition. UNICEF-WHO-WB Joint Child Malnutrition Estimates inter-agency group updates regularly the global and regional estimates in prevalence and numbers for each indicator. The key findings 2021 Edition includes global and regional trends and, for the first time, country-level estimates are also presented, with a summary of the enhanced methodology for deriving country-level model-based estimates for stunting and overweight. Country progress assessment towards the 2030 targets are provided with summaries by region. 

In 2020, globally, 149.2 million children under the age of 5 years of age were stunted, 45.4 million wasted, and 38.9 million overweight. The number of children with stunting is declining in all regions except Africa. More than half of all children affected by wasting live in Southern Asia and Asia as a whole is home to more than three-quarters of all children suffering from severe wasting. In terms of the targets, at country level, the greatest progress is being made towards the stunting target, with nearly two-thirds of countries seeing at least some progress. In contrast, for overweight, about half of all countries have experienced no progress or are worsening.  

Schermata 2022-02-21 alle 10