Minimum Dietary Diversity for Women

Minimum Dietary Diversity for Women (MDD-W) is a validated, dichotomous indicator of whether a woman of reproductive age consumed foods from at least five of ten defined food groups in the previous 24 hours, used as a population proxy for the micronutrient adequacy of women's diets. It was finalized in the 2016 FAO and FANTA guide A Guide to Measurement, following the consensus process documented by Martin-Prevel and colleagues that selected the ten-group list and the five-group cut-off from competing candidate indicators. Unlike the broader Individual Dietary Diversity Score, MDD-W is purpose-built for women aged 15 to 49 and yields a clean yes/no classification, making the share of women reaching the minimum a transparent, globally comparable diet-quality statistic for surveys and program monitoring.