There are no recommendations, and I could imagine that with variations in culture and society there will be variations in the numbers of underweight women and children. If you need more support I would suggest contacting WFP or other agencies in your area. Where are you located?

Thanks Mark for your reply. Last week I was in Eritrea to set up the SFP. We decided to have 10 % pregnant, 10 % lactating and 1% others so as to give under fives more space for beneficiaries. We have limited funding and the situation there needs more support than we can offer. There is no WFP or other NGO's working except one local NGO. Let me see how this percentages work in this project. Last project we registered 40 % preg & lactating mothers and this cut out too many under fives. Thanks for taking time on this.

I must say that I think restricting admission to a program on a percentage basis is unethical. Ether they need to be in the program or they so not. Perhaps it would be better to adjust (temporarily) the criteria for admission so that limited resources are given to those most in need. Or, more easily, to admit those who fulfill the established criteria until the number of beneficiaries reaches the capacity of the program - whilst at the same time advocating and cajoling other agencies, donors and the Govenment to step in. Having said that, the criteria for admitting pregnant and lactating women to SFP are not well established at all in terms of improved outcome with the various cut-offs - there has been very little reseach on this topic that I can find. I also find it unacceptable to reject children who are in immediate need of help just because they are over 59months of age. I think that it is critical to examine in depth the ethics of such programs before untested quotas are arbitrarily introduced by agencies.

Dear Micheal, Thanks for your reply. Let me know if you get any clear feedback on how to go about balancing pregnant and lactating women quota's, children under five and other groups in times of limited resources and high malnutrition rates. For sure we have had to adjust the criteria for admission - temporarily for both children under five plus pregnant and lactating mothers in order to support the most affected. If you get any lead on this - do let me know as it would be very helpful.