Economic Survey 2025-26: Diet diversity remains weak despite welfare push, warns survey

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Thursday presented the Economic Survey 2025-26 in Parliament, with the report flagging persistent nutrition gaps despite the rollout of multiple food security and nutrition programmes by the Centre and states.

The Survey notes that initiatives such as NFSA-linked public distribution, Poshan Abhiyan, mid-day meals, supplementary nutrition for adolescent girls, and take-home rations for pregnant and lactating mothers are aimed at improving nutrition outcomes across age groups.

Diet quality, awareness: key challenges

Despite these efforts, the Survey highlights that nutrition concerns persist due to underlying factors such as limited dietary diversity, poor food quality, changing consumption patterns, food taboos, and inadequate nutrition awareness.

It notes that access alone has not translated into better nutrition outcomes.

Cereal-heavy diets dominate food intake

The Survey finds that a significant share of the population consumes cereals in excess of recommended levels, while intake of protective foods such as legumes, milk, nuts, vegetables and fruits remains insufficient.

Region-wise data show that urban north India records among the highest fat intake, while the Northeast states report the highest calorie and carbohydrate consumption. Southern regions show a higher share of protein intake from meat, poultry and fish.

However, milk consumption remains low across regions, with only 8.7 per cent of rural and 14.3 per cent of urban populations consuming milk and milk products at recommended levels.

Dietary diversity improves, but gaps remain

The Survey also points to improvements in dietary diversity over the last decade. An EAC-PM study cited in the document shows that micronutrient intake has improved across all consumption classes between 2011–12 and 2022–23, with the most significant gains among the bottom 20 per cent of households.

This improvement has been enabled by better infrastructure, transport and storage, which have improved access to nutrient-rich foods.

Focus shifts to food quality and behaviour

The Economic Survey calls for strengthening nutrition interventions across all life stages, with a shift from access to food towards improving quality, bioavailability and outcome tracking.

It also recommends incorporating fortified and protein-rich foods into public nutrition programmes and promoting traditional foods such as millets and lesser-known pulses to reduce over-reliance on cereals.