A meta-analysis of community-based studies on quality protein….pdfVIP

Food Policy 35 (2010) 202–210 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Food Policy journal homepage: /locate/foodpol A meta-analysis of community-based studies on quality protein maize Nilupa S. Gunaratna a,*, Hugo De Groote b, Penelope Nestel c, Kevin V. Pixley d, George P. McCabe e a Nevin Scrimshaw International Nutrition Foundation, USA b International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT), Kenya c Institute of Human Nutrition, University of Southampton, UK d International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT), Mexico e Department of Statistics, Purdue University, USA a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Biofortification, or the improvement of nutritional quality in food crops, is a promising strategy to combat Received 10 September 2008 undernutrition, particularly among the rural poor in developing countries. However, traditional methods Received in revised form 28 October 2009 of impact assessment are inadequate for biofortified crops, as they do not consider their nutritional ben- Accepted 2 November 2009 efits. Evidence for the nutritional impact of maize varieties with improved protein quality, collectively known as quality protein maize (QPM), was evaluated using meta-analysis of randomized, controlled studies in target communities. A new and generalizable effect size was proposed to quantify the impact Keywords: