Chennai : A Chennai-born scientist of Indian origin, Mr Venkatesh Mannar, President, Micronutrient Initiative, has been given Canada’s highest civilian award – the Order of Canada.  For almost  40 years, Mr. Mannar has been working to reduce debilitating micronutrient deficiencies among the world’s most vulnerable. The organization, including MI’s Board of Directors and MI staff around the world, are pleased that his hard work and dedication is being recognized by one of the country’s highest civilian honours.

Mannar was born in Chennai, India and graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology Madras before doing post graduate work in chemical engineering at Northwestern University, USA. Mannar started his journey to saving and improving lives when he became interested in salt iodization; iodine is essential for brain development. As a sixth-generation salt processor in India, he became fascinated with the opportunities to end iodine deficiency disorders, the leading cause of preventable brain damage, by using salt as a vehicle for iodine. He left his family business to become a consultant for international agencies such as UNICEF, the World Food Programme and the World Health Organization in the area of salt iodization. He helped establish salt iodization in more than 50 countries, making a huge contribution to what is largely considered to be one of the most successful public health campaigns of the 20th century. Today nearly 4 billion people have access to iodized salt.

Mannar and his family chose Canada as their adopted home in 1990. In 1994, he was chosen to lead what was then a small pilot project associated with Canada’s International Development Research Centre called the Micronutrient Initiative (MI). Mannar spearheaded programs in vitamin A, which boosts children’s immune systems and saves their lives, salt iodization, and iron and folic acid, essential for the health of women and their babies. Under Mannar’s leadership, the organization has become an international and globally-respected not-for-profit Canadian organization, supporting programs that reach approximately 500 million people in more than 70 countries each year. With support from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and other generous donors, MI is now expanding its life-saving work into new areas that includes scaling up zinc for the treatment of diarrhoea, community-based maternal and newborn health, and multiple micronutrients for the health, growth and development of children.

Mannar’s engineering background and interest in food fortification led him to co-invent, with Dr. Levente Diosady of the University of Toronto, Double Fortified Salt, whereby iron is added to iodized salt to reduce both iron and iodine deficiencies. This innovation earned him the Nokia Tech Award for Health in 2010 and has the potential to deliver both of these life-enhancing micronutrients to millions of people.

Micronutrients are vitamins and minerals needed by the body in only small quantities but make a huge difference to survival and health. Around the world, billions of people live with vitamin and mineral deficiencies, putting them at greater risk of death and disabilities. The world’s poorest citizens, especially women and children, are the most vulnerable to micronutrient deficiencies. When whole populations suffer from malnutrition, including a lack of critical vitamins and minerals, nations likewise cannot fulfill their potential.