What if there were a product that could beat back the costly effects of malnutrition? What if this product could be made cheaply, anywhere in the world and have a near-indefinite shelf life? The New York Times Magazine’s recent article “The Peanut Solution” describes how this product may have already been created.
Plumpy’nut, “…an edible paste of made of peanuts, packed with calories and vitamins, that is specially formulated to renourish starving children” has been on the market for about five years and has has been highly effective at helping starving and malnourished children to quickly regain weight.
Plumpy’nut became the darling of the humanitarian aid community, which began successfully using it. The article points out, however, that the French company which developed Plumpy’nut, Nutriset, has been “aggressively [protecting] its intellectual property, and the bulk of Plumpy’net production continues to take place in Nutriset facilities in France.”
Charities and aid organizations must raise or requisition funds to purchase Plumpy’nut from Nutriset for use in their aid missions. Because Plumpy’nut is easy to manufacture and a version of the product could conceivably be made locally and cheaply in the countries where it is needed.
The article opens the question of the intellectual property protections that Nutriset is enforcing on the product. Is “poverty a business” as one aid organization’s head suggests in the article? Or should Nutriset loosen its intellectual property restrictions on the manufacture of Plumpy’nut?
Posted by Michael Lucivero.
Photo credit: Save the Children
