I do not recall “carbs” ever being used to mean “nutritional value”. In fact it’s almost always the opposite, with “empty carbs” (i.e. foods that contain carbs and almost no other vitamins, etc.) being the primary target of campaigns telling people to avoid them. If anything, carb-heavy foods would benefit from having lower carbs, since it would increase the relative amounts of actually healthy stuff in them.

Focusing on carbs leads to situations where people may be overweight, but also malnourished, which is increasingly common in poor areas.