Common responses include handing out vitamin pills and fortifying common foods with micronutrients (such as putting iodine in salt).

ECONOMIST: How much can farming really improve people��s health?

They are simultaneously over- and underfed: too many calories, not enough micronutrients.

ECONOMIST: Arab diets

In the early part of the century, scientists fed rats very limited diets, teasing out the effects of various foods and the micronutrients they contained, including vitamin D.

FORBES: Vitamin D: Still More Questions Than Answers

Whole grains are more than just starch, containing up to 25% of other goodies, including protein, fiber, and added healthy omega-3's, along with a complex mixture of vitamins, minerals, and other micronutrients.

CNN: A family's guide to healthy food substitutes

Prof John Beattie, head of the micronutrients group at the University of Aberdeen, said NF-kB cropped up in many processes in the body, including atherosclerosis, which leads to blocked arteries seen in heart disease and has been linked to zinc deficiency.

BBC: Zinc 'keeps immune system in check'

If 20 years later the family gets a more plentiful yet still poor diet (with a lot of calories but not many micronutrients, such as iron or vitamins) she will become overweight or obese, while her children will suffer nutritional deficiency, such as anaemia or blindness.

ECONOMIST: Arab diets