Abstract: Objective To assess nutritional knowledge awareness among primary students in rural poor areas,and to provide scientific basis for nutrition improvement and appropriate nutritional intervention.Methods Random multi-stage clustering sampling method was employed to select 2 939 primary students from 5 rural areas:Pingquan in Hebei,Wufeng in Hubei,Longyang in Yunan,Pingyang in Hunan,Dunhua in Jiling.And then a self-designed questionnaire was conducted to collect their basic information and information regarding nutritional knowledge.Results The accurate rates of nutritional knowledge ranged from 21.4% to 97.4%.Among them,the awareness rate of nutrition breakfast food(21.4%) was lowest,and the rate of choice of drinks (92.2%) and a reasonable choice of snacks(97.4%) ranked highest.The resident students were more correct in most questions than the non-resident students (P<0.01).The accuracy rate of the students with no migrant parents or only migrant father was higher than those with migrant parents or migrant mother (P<0.01).The accuracy rate of the relevant knowledge increased with the increasing grade,and the differences between areas were of statistical significance (P<0.01).The average score of the nutritional knowledge among the students at the high grade was (6.03± 1.75).The differences lying in grade,area,whether board or not,whether having immigrant parents or not were of statistical significance (P<0.01).Conclusion The primary students in rural poor areas are lack of nutritional knowledge.School-based nutritional propaganda and education should be offered to improve the nutritional knowledge of primary students.