17 October 2014 – The Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI) through the Department of Science and Technology IV-A (DOST IV-A) divulged during the Regional Dissemination Forum on the 8th National Nutrition Survey (NNS) at the Traders Hotel, Pasay City that Calabarzon region is presently facing a double burden of malnutrition: high undernutrition prevalene concurrently exists with high overnutrition prevalence. Around 50 nutrition stakeholders including nutrition action officers, nutrition program coordinators, information officers, regional line agencies representatives, dean and director of state colleges and universities (SUCs) and non-government organizations delegates in the region attended the forum.

The survey results showed that about 9 in every 100 (8.7%) pre-school children in Calabarzon were underweight for their age (or wasted). Compared to the national prevalence of 7.9%, the Calabarzon region shows higher prevalence. Moreover, wasting was also widespread among the school children of the region, having 9.2% prevalence compared to the 8.6% national prevalence. In addition to this, adolescents in the region also suffer from wasting. The survey showed that the regional prevalence of wasting among adolescents was 3% higher than the national prevalence of 12.4%. The same holds true with the underweight prevalence among lactating mothers in the region having 1.6% higher than the national prevalence. Also, the occurrence of nutritionally-at-risk pregnant women in Calabarzon (28.7%) was higher than of the national level (24.8%).