[Phoebe] Welcome to Beyond The Data.
I'm Dr. Phoebe Thorpe and here
with me today is Mr. Scott Montgomery,
from the Food Fortification Initiative.
Thank you for joining us.
Today's session was about neural tube defects
and preventing them globally.
Neural tube defects are devastating birth defects
of the brain and spine and we have known for a while
that folic acid can prevent neural tube defects.
But it takes fortification in flour which is done
through milling and you're a miller so, how did you get
from being a miller into global fortification efforts?
[Scott] Well that takes me back to about 2004
and at the time I was the vice president of operations
of Cargill Global Wheat Flour Maize and Rice Nine businesses.
And the CDC visited the Minneapolis headquarters
of Cargill and I was invited to attend that meeting.
At that meeting from the CDC was Bell Dietz who was that at
that time the director of nutrition on physical activity
and obesity and also a gentleman named Glenn Maberly
from Emory University's was at that meeting
and Glenn was a director of the food fortification initiative.
At the time is called the flower fortification initiative
and Glenn had spent years in salt iodization.
I traveled to China thousand times and just globally worked
and salt iodization and the one thing he recognizes salt
iodization really took off
when the private sector was joined in the effort.
So Glenn could not say two sentences
without same public-private relation or partnerships.
And so I asked Glenn, who's your private-sector representative?
And he told me he said; actually Cargill should be.
So, Cargill joined at that time the flower fortification
initiative and I joined the board
or the executive management team.
And then about a year later I was asked to be the chair
of the board of the executive management team.
So that that was through 2010 and then I retired from Cargill
after 30 years in multiple jobs and businesses.
And I had to replace myself, and I talked to the on CEO
of the largest milling company in Southeast Asia
and he said yeah I'll do that.
And he said by the way once you come work for us?
So I had passion for the work
but no time Cargill and I said sure.
So I began became the industry liaison.
And, and then shortly after that,
they asked me to be the director.
So years and 30 years in the private sector,
my goal was to make money.
Now I wake up every morning and my goal is
to eliminate the burden of micronutrient deficiencies
by adding vitamins and minerals in particular folic acid
to cereal grains to prevent spinal bifida as an example
and neural tube defects.
[Phoebe] From the session today we, we heard that it isn't just,
you are right, isn't just about the millers and industrial.
It's also about finding where things work
and where you can push things forward
and your group has looked at a number
of different countries to, to try to figure out where that is.
What are some of the factors that you looked
at when you thought you could have the most impact
in the short run?
[Scott] First and foremost I would say political will.
That's, that's a deal breaker.
So the ministers of health, always champions of the cause.
But that's just one isolated silo
and that government structure.
So we need buy in from the Ministry of Agriculture,
the Ministry of Industry, and the Minister of Finance
and even more importantly
if we can get the executive level support
from that country's government then we can build the
political well.
We also need champions
who understands the incredible benefit
of doing this the very low investment to do it
and they can push that internally in that country.
[Phoebe] Yeah, I remember the quote you had from the miller
about just sold so little money and so much good.
[Scott] Yeah I think the enduring value
of a minuscule cause and tremendous benefits.
The second thing once we have the political will,
we need to understand supply chain and the consumption
of those serial based grain in that country.
So we do analysis supply chain we try
and understand the consumption patterns, who is eating what
and what the industrial milling complexes
and how many people we can reach.
There's no sense fortifying staples
that are not widely consumed.
[Phoebe] Sure.
[Scott] And then I'd say third,
once you understand there is political will, that it's doable
and you can make a significant impact on the population,
then you need a private public specific team to work
on it in country team.
We can supply all the technical support they need leveraging
global knowledge and experience, the local teams has
to make it happen on the ground.
[Phoebe] And in the session today we heard about an effort
in Tanzania that is what I will consider more local effort,
it's a little bit different, it's working with smaller
and medium-sized mills, but it also had a big component
of education and creating a market for the fortification
because that's it that's the other side of supply
and demand is it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a pull demand.
[Scott] Sure.
I would...
the easiest way for me to answer
that so you can compare the large industrial milling
and mandatory fortification to the small mills.
So on large industrial milling complexes
that reach a large portion of the population
and fortification mandated, we reach the people.
They consume those staples and we reach the people
and they consume that fortified staple food.
There is in the tremendous amount of its consumer marketing
so to speak needed because they are consuming it.
[Phoebe] Sure [Scott] That being said, the millers need
to properly label that that flour
or rice whatever's been fortified
and we do encourage the governments
to at least you know educate the population
that this is good this is good stuff.
In the small mill environment,
the consumer education marking can be much more critical.
As you have hundreds to thousands of these mills
and for the governments to monitor in and ensure
that all those mills are in compliance
with the fortification standards it's difficult
and is very costly.
But if the consumers can be educated and demand
from the suppliers we want this fortified maze flowers example
in Tanzania, and they label it and put logos on to identify it,
that can really on help
that program be impactful and effective.
[Phoebe] And I know we've had a lot of success in you bring
out its 97 NTD's Neural Tube Defects a day that are prevented
by fortification the fortification
that were doing now but there's more to do.
What, what else is to be done?
[Scott] 97 days a great success story.
That being said, we are not nearer where we need to be.
So we estimated approximately 35,000 neural tube defects are
prevented current fortification, mass fortification,
there's an opportunity to add 165,000 to that.
So that's the opportunity fortifying industrial
mill grains.
So yes, we celebrate for the success and it's a great story,
we have a long ways to go.
[Phoebe] Yeah, but it sounds like five times,
you can do five times more what you're doing now.
[Scott] Yes.
[Phoebe] And I, I heard from what you said
and from the session, is it's, it's not hard
but it's complicated and so it's doable but it takes a lot
of thinking through in planning and its but it's doable.
And I look forward to when we have accomplished that.
[Scott] Yeah, I do to.
[Phoebe] Yeah.
Thank you very much for joining us.
[Scott] My pleasure, thank you.
[Phoebe] And thank you for joining us for Beyond the Data.
See you next time.