Improving rural diets at scale #2

Improving the quality of diets for rural populations is a shared priority for many actors including donors, implementing NGOs, and governments. However, achieving success at scale remains elusive.

Over the last year, Wellspring supported the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) in hosting a series of in-person and online consultations with partners of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs. These discussions focused on how to improve diet quality in rural areas of Low and Lower-Middle Income countries, where nutrition challenges are both urgent and nuanced. Key learnings included:

🔍Scaling needs commitment:

There is no clear definition of what makes a nutrition project small, medium, or large. Yet, with 2.4 billion people living in rural areas across lower-middle-income and low-income countries – many struggling with poor diets – the need for large-scale solutions is huge.  But, if “large-scale” were to mean reaching 1 million people or more, then very few sustainable projects for rural diets have achieved this. Despite the challenges, success at scale is possible through long-term commitment, reliable financing, and flexibility to adapt across geographies.

🔍Control what you have, influence where you can:

Large-scale programmes must coordinate across a diverse set of actors. Some stakeholders will sit inside the programme governance structure, while others—such as local or national governments—will operate outside of it, but still play a critical role. To avoid misalignment, programmes need dedicated resources for internal coordination and must invest in relationship-building and orchestration to align interests with and between influential third parties.

🔍Plan for trade-offs, prepare for surprises:

Large, complex programmes must balance multiple priorities, such as improving nutrition while also minimizing negative climate impact. Trade-offs are inevitable—and not all will be visible at the outset. It is crucial to identify and surface known trade-offs early, while building in monitoring systems and pilot phases to catch unintended consequences before programme interventions are scaled.