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BACKGROUND: The government of Bangladesh has implemented multiple policies since 1971 to provide the population with more diverse and nutritious diets. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to examine the drivers of dietary change over time and the roles agriculture and economic development have played. METHODS: We used principal component analysis to derive dietary patterns from 7 cross-sectional rounds of the Bangladesh Household [Income and] Expenditure Survey. We then used linear probability models to estimate associations of adherence to dietary patterns with socio-economic characteristics of households, and with agricultural production on the household and regional level. For dietary patterns that increased or decreased over time, Blinder–Oaxaca decomposition was used to assess factors associated with these changes. RESULTS: Seven dietary patterns were identified: modern, traditional, festival, winter, summer, monotonous, and spices. All diets were present in all survey rounds. In 1985, over 40% of households had diets not associated with any identified pattern, which declined to 12% by 2010. The proportion of the population in households adhering to the modern, winter, summer, and monotonous diets increased over time, whereas the proportion adhering to the traditional diet decreased. Although many factors were associated with adherence to dietary patterns in the pooled sample, changes in observed factors only explained a limited proportion of change over time due to variation in coefficients between periods. Increased real per capita expenditure was the largest driver of elevated adherence to dietary patterns over time, whereas changes in the agricultural system increased adherence to less diverse dietary patterns. CONCLUSIONS: These findings highlight the need for both diversified agricultural production and a continued reduction in poverty in order to drive dietary improvement. This study lays the groundwork for further analysis of the impact of changing diets on health and nutrition.

The international development community is off-track from meeting targets for alleviating global malnutrition. Meanwhile, there is growing consensus across scientific disciplines that fish plays a crucial role in food and nutrition security. However, this 'fish as food' perspective has yet to translate into policy and development funding priorities. We argue that the traditional framing of fish as a natural resource emphasizes economic development and biodiversity conservation objectives, whereas situating fish within a food systems perspective can lead to innovative policies and investments that promote nutrition-sensitive and socially equitable capture fisheries and aquaculture. This paper highlights four pillars of research needs and policy directions toward this end. Ultimately, recognizing and working to enhance the role of fish in alleviating hunger and malnutrition can provide an additional long-term development incentive, beyond revenue generation and biodiversity conservation, for governments, international development organizations, and society more broadly to invest in the sustainability of capture fisheries and aquaculture. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-020-01451-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Blue foods – fish, invertebrates, algae and aquatic plants captured or cultured in freshwater and marine ecosystems – play a central role in food and nutrition security for billions of people and are a cornerstone of the livelihoods, economies, and cultures of many coastal and riparian communities. Blue food systems are extraordinarily diverse, involving thousands of species in many different production systems and supporting a wide array of cultures and diets. Many blue foods are rich in please see back-page) bioavailable micronutrients and can be produced in ways that are more environmentally sustainable than terrestrial animal-source foods. Yet despite their unique value and interconnections with terrestrial food systems, blue foods are often left out of food system analyses, discussions, decisions, and solutions. Realizing the potential of blue foods to play a central role in ending malnutrition and in building healthy, nature-positive and resilient food systems will require that governments embed blue foods in food- system governance. Here, we focus on three central imperatives for policymakers.