Stunting is a significant public health issue affecting under-five children in rural Madagascar, where malnutrition remains prevalent. The study employed cross-sectional data from a sample of 500 under-five children enrolled in primary schools across four regions of Madagascar. Stunting was measured using World Health Organisation (WHO) criteria, and anthropometric measurements were taken to assess child growth development. Stunting reduction rates were found to be significantly higher among children who received school feeding programmes compared to those not participating, with a mean stunting rate of 25% in the intervention group versus 40% in the control group (p < 0. 01). School feeding programmes effectively reduce stunting rates and improve child growth development metrics in rural Madagascar. Further implementation of school feeding programmes should be considered as a key strategy to address childhood malnutrition in Madagascar. Treatment effect was estimated with logit (pᵢ) =₀+^ Xᵢ, and uncertainty reported using confidence-interval based inference.
Randriambololona et al. (Thu,) studied this question.