On World AIDS Day, it would be nice to be able to point to how agrobiodiversity can help the more than 40 million people living with HIV around the world. Not easy, alas. There’s an FAO strategy-type document from 2003. And what looks like a project from Wageningen University that’s just about to end. But very little else in the way of concrete examples, at least that I could find in the first few pages of a Google search. There was a piece today reviewing the role of nutrition in dealing with HIV/AIDS, but this mainly dealt with supplements. Can this possibly be it?
For a couple of years now ECHO has held a multiday workshop focusing on agricultural and nutritional hurdles for PLWHA – as a matter of fact the next offering starts in a couple of days.
I have a feeling there isn’t much information. A few programs have tried to link up agriculture with HIV, such as HAART n HARVEST but very little else has been done.
Most of the nutrition linked with HIV patients has been clinical and if there is any sort of food involved, it is usually food aid in the form of cornsoya blend flour and oil programs.
Crazy right?