The Rhode Island Congressional delegation, all Democrats, joined USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah for a tour of Edesia Global Nutrition Solutions in Providence last week. From left are Rep. Jim Langevin, Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., Edesia founder and executive director Navyn Salem, Shah, and Sen. Jack Reed. (Edesia)


U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Rajiv Shah joined Rhode Island’s congressional delegation last week to tour Edesia Global Nutrition Solutions, a Providence, R.I., food manufacturer.

Using mostly U.S.-produced ingredients including peanuts, Edesia has produced Ready-to-use-therapeutic food (RUTF) and ready-to-use-supplementary food (RUSF) packets for USAID to supply to malnourished children.

Edesia also produces a product called Nutributter through a USAID Office of Food for Peace program to reduce the prevalence of stunting worldwide. Edesia’s Providence factory employs about 48 people, including former refugees from Liberia, Sierra Leone, Burundi, and Burma.

Ready-to-use foods, invented by the French company Nutriset, have a two-year shelf life, require no cooking or dilution in water before use, and can be consumed directly from the packet.

“In the Horn of Africa, we saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of kids because we were able to bring these types of newly formulated, scientifically-enhanced food products to children as opposed to the way that things might have taken place in the 1990s,” Shah said in a news release after the August 29 tour.

“That scientific advance means that this type of product, of which Edesia is our primary partner, will be a much bigger part of our food mix for the next several decades, and it will need to be if we are going to end preventable child death and child hunger.”

• Edesia Global Nutrition Solutions
• USAID — The Future of Food Assistance: U.S. Food Aid Reform