We know that pregnant women should folic acid before and during pregnancy to help prevent birth defects in babies.  Now, a new study is finding that folic acid, along with iron, can improve their children’s intellectual and motor skills.

Children in rural Nepal whose mothers were given iron and folic acid supplements during pregnancy were smarter, more organized and had better fine motor skills than children whose mothers did not get them, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

“Iron is essential for the development of the central nervous system,” said Parul Christian of Johns Hopkins University, whose study appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The research team studied 676 children aged 7 to 9 years whose mothers participated in a clinical trial in which some received iron and folic acid while pregnant in Nepal.

“What we showed is prenatal iron and folic acid supplementation had a significant impact on the offspring’s intellectual level and motor ability and ability during school age, which was a very exciting finding,” she said.

“It had an impact across a range of function, including intellectual function, executive function and fine motor function,” factors that could affect a child’s later academic success, Christian said.

Researchers said that ensuring that pregnant women get this basic prenatal care could have a huge effect on the futures of these children’s education who live in poor communities.

Iron deficiency is the most common and widespread nutritional disorder in the world, affecting 2 billion people, according to the World Health Organization.