The chairman of the House committee on nutrition and food security, Chike Okafor, has sponsored a bill to establish the Nutritionist Registration Council of Nigeria.

The private-member bill was presented for the first reading during plenary on Thursday.

Mr Okafor said that the bill was a necessary legislative response to a “ticking time bomb” of malnutrition and food insecurity in the country.

He explained that food insecurity threatens national development and the well-being of Nigerian citizens.

“It is with a profound sense of responsibility that I present this legislation for the establishment of the Nutritionists Registration Council of Nigeria. This bill is a necessary legislative response to a ticking time bomb of malnutrition and food insecurity that threatens our national development and the wellness of Nigerian citizens,” he said.

He said that the bill is not in competition with the Dietitians Council Bill, but that both mutually reinforce, but are clearly different disciplines.

He reaffirmed his belief that the bill would ensure that the Nutritionists Registration Council remain vital for the entire spectrum of the community and public health nutrition.

According to him, the council will ensure maternal and child nutrition, food and nutrition policy, academic nutrition research, and programme implementation, among many others.

Mr Okafor said a nutritionist is not legally protected in Nigeria, and this has led to what he described as the “ugly balkanisation of the profession”, leaving it “vulnerable to the invasion of quacks”.

He, however, described the bill as the necessary legislative response to close that gap and protect the public from unqualified practitioners.

Mr Okafor explained that the council, if established, would regulate the nutrition profession and ensure the public could distinguish between a clinically trained dietitian for disease management and a non-trained person.

The lawmaker reiterated that “the bill stands as an antidote to the ugly past as it closes that gap of infiltration and nonregulation of very key and important wellness needs”.

He said that the council would regulate, control and standardise the practice of nutritionists in Nigeria.

(NAN)