Abstract:
In Asia, rice provides more than 70% of the energy in the diet. Rice is the single most important crop occupying
34.0% of the total cultivated area in Sri Lanka. About 1.8 million farm families are engaged in paddy cultivation
island-wide, produce 2.7 million tonnes of paddy annually and satisfy around 95.0% of the domestic requirement. As
such, rice can be a good candidate for fortification with micronutrients because it is the staple diet of all sectors of
the population, consumed almost daily in large amounts in Sri Lanka. This intervention programme describes the
feasibility of rice flour fortification to increase the micronutrient intake and thereby to improve growth and status of
iron, zinc and folate of Sri Lankan population.
