Design of optimal food-based complementary feeding recommendations and identification of key problem nutrients using goal programming

The WHO is urging countries to promote improved complementary feeding practices to ensure optimal health, growth, and development of young children. To help achieve this, a rigorous 4-phase approach for designing optimal population-specific food-based complementary feeding recommendations (CFRs) was developed and is illustrated here. In phase 1, an optimized diet is selected, using goal programming (Model #1), which aims to provide a desired nutrient content with respect to habitual diet patterns and cost. Based on its food patterns, a set of draft CFRs is designed. In phase 11, their success for ensuring a nutritionally adequate diet is assessed via linear programming (Model type #2) by sequentially minimizing and maximizing the level of each nutrient (i.e., worst and best-case scenarios) while respecting the CFRs. For nutrients that are < 70% of desired levels, the best food sources are identified via linear programming in phase III (Model #3). Different combinations of these foods are incorporated into the original draft of the CFRs to produce alternative CFRs, which are then compared on the basis of their cost, flexibility, and worst-case scenario nutrient levels (Model type #2) to select, in phase IV, a final set of CFRs. A hypothetical example is used to illustrate this approach. Outcomes include a set of optimal, population-specific CFRs and practical information regarding key problem nutrients in the local diet. Such information is valuable for nutrition promotion, as well as nutrition program planning and advocacy, to help achieve global initiatives for improving the complementary feeding practices of young children living in disadvantaged environments.