WEBINAR ON
Effective Implementation of the IMS Act,
Dated: 30th September 2020| Time: 11.00 am
Organised by BPNI 
in Partnership with WHO India 
and UNICEF India 
Background
In 1992, Government of India recognised that baby food promotion is much more rampant than promotion of breastfeeding and it leads to morbidity and deaths among young children. Therefore, the Government enacted The Infant Milk Substitutes Feeding Bottles, and Infant Foods (Regulation of Production, Supply and Distribution) Act 1992, and Amendment Act 2003 (IMS Act) in order to regulate marketing of the baby foods as follow up to the International Code of Marketing of Breast milk Substitutes. It has three products under the scope: Infant milk substitutes, Infant foods, and feeding bottles.
BPNI was notified in the official gazette of India in 1995 to monitor the compliance with the IMS Act. (Under section 21 (1) (C) wide Circular G.S.R. 562(E) on 24th July 1995.
Inspite of prohibition mandated in the IMS Act, Baby food or feeding bottle companies use different strategies to promote their products. We continue to witness on-going violations more so in the health care system. During the Covid-19 pandemic, such activities have been rather scaled up as an ‘opportunity’.
BPNI is organising this Webinar in partnership with WHO India and UNICEF India to discuss different provisions of the IMS Act, examples of violations by the baby food and feeding bottle companies and will talk about recommendations for effective enforcement of the Act.
Target Audience: The webinar will be useful for BPNI members, Counselling specialists, Doctors, Nursing staff, State government health, food safety and nutrition functionaries, UNICEF functionaries etc.
SPEAKERS
Ms. Aastha Saxena Khatwani
Joint Secretary (POSHAN Abhiyaan; Anganwadi Services;
Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY);
Scheme for Adolescent Girls (SAG); Food & Nutrition Board (FNB))
Ministry of Women and Child Development
Government of India
Dr. Rachita GUPTA, (Ph.D.)
National Professional Officer, Nutrition
WHO Country Office for India
A public health nutritionist with over a decade of experience, Dr. Rachita Gupta is the National Professional Officer, Nutrition at the World Health Organization’s Country Office for India (WHO, India). At WHO, her portfolio includes advocating on nutrition and health issues and providing technical support to Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Ministry of Women and Child Development, Niti Ayog, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India for advancing nutrition policies, strategies and plans, and their implementation to promote equitable nutrition and development. She joined WHO in 2015 and since then has been working on addressing the emerging double burden of malnutrition in India, i.e. undernutrition, including micronutrient deficiencies and overweight and obesity, with its antecedent risk of non-communicable diseases. Her interests and work include providing support/expertise to develop and strengthen governance and capacity of government bodies to deliver of life-course nutrition interventions through health systems, other settings and their monitoring and evaluation. Dr Gupta has also provided leadership and support to MoHFW and FSSAI towards enabling food environments to support healthy diets through implementing population-based actions that reduce the dietary risk of noncommunicable diseases.
Dr. Gayatri Singh,
Child Development Specialist, UNICEF India
Dr. Gayatri Singh is a professional in the field of public health nutrition and holds a Ph.D degree in Nutrition. She is currently working as Child Development Specialist in UNICEF, New Delhi. In UNICEF she leads the work on infant and young child feeding. She has worked extensively with National and State Governments, Academic Institutions and with NGO partners in designing, implementing and managing large scale programmes for early childhood development and nutrition.
Dr. Arun Gupta (MD Ped)
Central Coordinator BPNI
Dr. Arun Gupta, a pediatrician in public service, founded the Breastfeeding Promotion Network of India (BPNI) in 1991. Over nearly 30 years, BPNI has played key role in strengthening national policies to promote, protect and support breastfeeding, which has led to almost negligible growth of breast-milk substitutes. Dr. Gupta has worked on policy analysis related to breastfeeding and complementary feeding. Part of this work involved conceptualizing and creating IBFAN’s World Breastfeeding Trends Initiative (WBTi), a break-through tool to bring together key government, academic, and NGOs to identify gaps and generate action, and created a unique web repository of policy and programmes. He has also written extensively on child nutrition and conflicts of interest and, in 2015, convened “Nutrition Advocacy in Public Interest” (NAPi) http://napiindia.in/wedo.html. His strong belief in the legal frameworks to protect public health has made significant impact in countries. Dr. Gupta coordinates BPNI and the South Asia part of International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN), which is a 1998 Right Livelihood Award recipient. In 2001, the Dr. Gupta was named a Fellow of Indian Academy of Pediatrics.. Email Id-arun.ibfan@gmail.com
Dr. JP Dadhich MD (Paediatrics); FNNF
National Coordinator, BPNI
Download PowerPoint Presentation
Supporting mother to breastfeed Implementation of IMS Act- Dr. Gayatri Singh, Child Development Specialist, UNICEF India
History and Provisions of the IMS Act- Dr. JP Dadhich, National Coordinator, BPNI
Webinar's Video-recording
Language: English
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