A study of food habits and dietary intake of the hill korwa tribe of Sarguja District, Chhattisgarh

Hill Korwa tribe is one of the Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs) of Chhattisgarh. The objective of the present study is to assess the food habits, alcohol consumption, tobacco use, food consumption pattern and dietary intake of Hill Korwas. A total of 307 families from Lundra, Batauli, and Sitapur blocks of Sarguja district were selected randomly for the sampling purpose and their head of households were interviewed for the data collection. Dietary intake assessment was done with the help of 24 hours recall methods. The collected data were further compared with balanced diets recommend by ICMR. Typically this Hill Korwa community has two distinct activities, agricultural activities and non-agriculture activities such as hunting, fishing, gathering, and handicrafts. Both these activities are the main hub of the Hill Korwa economy. In this paper it has been observed that majority (99.3%) of studied Hill Korwas are non-vegetarian. 94.14% households of Hill Korwas were not able to get more than two meals in a day. 99.3% of them consume alcohol on daily basis. Hill Korwas main vegetarian diet includes rice, Kutki, Kodo, Maize, Tangun, Manjhary, Ragi, Bede, pulses etc. Likewise, they also eat different types of tubers namely Pithoura Kand, Got Kand, Kunkuni Kand etc. collected from the forest. Food intake and nutrient intake deficiency is high among studied population. The study suggests that regional need based planning with proper effective intervention programmes should be implemented to improve the nutritional status of these people.