Evidence for the effects of complementary feeding interventions on the growth of infants and young children in low- and middle-income countries

As momentum for investment in early childhood nutrition grows, so does the evidence base for the effectiveness of interventions to improve complementary feeding in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC), where the risk of early growth faltering is high. The aim of this chapter is to review the current state of the evidence for the impact of two categories of interventions (nutrition education alone and provision of food or nutrient supplements with or without education) on linear and ponderal growth of children aged 6-23 months in LMIC. Pooled-effect sizes from three recent systematic reviews consistently suggest a modest but significant effect of both types of complementary feeding interventions on weight and length gain. However, interpretation of these pooled estimates is limited by the variability in intervention design and inconsistency in reporting of growth outcomes across the relatively small number of rigorous controlled trials currently available in the literature.