2015 Articles

SPRING Working Paper: Systems Thinking and Action for Nutrition

Fanzo, Jessica C.

Practitioners working in nutrition must start thinking about the effect food, health, and education systems have on nutrition practices and outcomes. “Systems thinking” means paying attention to the unpredictable interactions among actors, sectors, disciplines, and determinants of nutrition. That thinking results in new ways of approaching, analyzing, and solving challenges, which must be applied through policy development, program design, implementation, and research. SPRING approaches systems in two ways – by articulating and promoting systems thinking for nutrition and by strengthening specific components of those systems. This paper makes the case for why systems thinking is important for nutrition and proposes several approaches to strengthening systems for nutrition.