Sierra Leone
Scaling Up Nutrition and Food Systems Coordination Unit, with the Ministerial Steering Committee and Multistakeholder Platform
Sierra Leone coordinates nutrition and food systems from the Office of the Vice President, through a dedicated unit established in 2014 that convenes a ministerial steering committee and a multistakeholder platform of more than 200 members. Coordination is led by the national food systems convener, a Minister of State in that Office. This institutional set up can be classed as a dual stakeholder-centric mechanism with a supporting unit.
Scaling Up Nutrition and Food Systems Coordination Unit
Institutional set-up and structure. Established in 2014 in the Office of the Vice President, the Unit oversees, coordinates and monitors the country's eleven national nutrition coordinating bodies. It supports the national food systems convener and services both the ministerial steering committee and the technical coordination committee.
Mandate and decision-making power. The Unit leads cross-sector coordination on nutrition and food systems and drives the national food systems and nutrition agenda. It convenes the ministerial steering committee and the technical coordination committee from the Office of the Vice President, develops and manages national coordination tools including policies, strategies and data systems, advocates for nutrition and food systems transformation, mobilises resources and partnerships, facilitates real-time data collection and adaptive action, promotes evidence generation and research, strengthens accountability through monitoring and reporting, and engages stakeholders through inclusive platforms.
The Unit is tasked with the following roles (building blocks):
Agenda setting: advocacy and dialogue
Policy formulation and decision making: coordinating policy development
Implementation: coordinating financial resources and the budget
Monitoring and evaluation: tracking progress, evaluating and reporting
Who is involved
Government: ministries, departments and agencies, including the directorate of food and nutrition
Development partners: United Nations agencies and bilateral partners, with a collaboration under way to co-develop a national food systems coordination strategy aligned to government development goals
How it works in practice
Facilitates a joint annual assessment convening stakeholders from government, civil society and development partners to review progress and set priorities for the year ahead; the 2024 assessment brought together 46 stakeholders and set five priorities for 2025
Working towards regular coordination meetings at national and district level, timely data collection across government, civil society and the private sector for tracking progress against nutrition commitments, and open access to a functioning online information system
Ministerial Steering Committee
Institutional set-up and structure. Established in 2014 and convened by the Unit from the Office of the Vice President, with the inter-ministerial food systems committee chaired by the Vice President. Also known as the task force.
Mandate and decision-making power. The Committee represents the voice of all platform members in national discussions on nutrition and health, and provides oversight of the governance, management and coordination of the multistakeholder platform.
The Committee is tasked with the following role (building block): Agenda setting: deciding on goals and strategic priorities
Who is involved
Government: ministers and senior government representatives, with the Vice President chairing the inter-ministerial committee
Platform constituencies represented: civil society organisations, community-based bodies and non-registered groups, alongside academia, United Nations agencies, international civil society organisations and the European Union
How it works in practice
Convened by the Coordination Unit from the Office of the Vice President
Provides oversight of the platform's governance, management and coordination
Multistakeholder Platform
Institutional set-up and structure. Established in 2014 alongside the government structures, with more than 200 members, of which 178 are civil society and community-based organisations and 52 are media organisations.
Mandate and decision-making power. The platform plays a key role in advocacy and policy influencing, capacity development, awareness generation, community engagement, communication, emergency response, and information and knowledge management across direct and nutrition-sensitive issues. It engages government stakeholders to support national efforts to scale up nutrition, advocating for reductions in child undernutrition, improved food security, and better access to healthcare, education, water and sanitation and other nutrition-sensitive interventions.
The platform is tasked with the following roles (building blocks):
Agenda setting: advocacy and dialogue
Implementation: coordinating policy and programme delivery
Who is involved
Government: ministries, departments and agencies, including the directorate of food and nutrition and the directorate of immunisation
Development partners: United Nations agencies and international non-governmental organisations
Civil society: registered and unregistered organisations, community bodies and media, together numbering over 200 members
Academia and parliamentarians
Private sector: companies participating through the platform
How it works in practice
Works closely with the ministries of health and sanitation, agriculture forestry and food security, education science and technology, and social welfare gender and children's affairs
Takes part in the joint annual assessment alongside government and development partners
Evidence base: policy documents only, 2026. Last updated: September 2026.
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