Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review
Traditional complementary foods (TCFs) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) majorly comprised of starchy foods such as maize, sorghum, wheat, cassava and millet which are energy and nutrient deficient. This review summarizes the existing evidence on the potential of incorporating nutritious underutilized pla...
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Elsevier
2025-06-01
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| Series: | Applied Food Research |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772502225000368 |
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| author | Diriba Chewaka Tura Tefera Belachew Dessalegn Tamiru Kalkidan Hassen Abate |
| author_facet | Diriba Chewaka Tura Tefera Belachew Dessalegn Tamiru Kalkidan Hassen Abate |
| author_sort | Diriba Chewaka Tura |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Traditional complementary foods (TCFs) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) majorly comprised of starchy foods such as maize, sorghum, wheat, cassava and millet which are energy and nutrient deficient. This review summarizes the existing evidence on the potential of incorporating nutritious underutilized plant foods into TCFs with the application of common processing methods to enhance the nutritional value of the resultant complementary foods in SSA. Online web databases; Google Scholar, Web of Science, Scopus, and PubMed were searched, and the articles retrieved were screened using the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The review revealed that maize; apredominant stable crop used for the formulation of complementary food was enriched with amaranth, moringa and baobab that resulted in the enhancement of protein, iron, calcium, zinc, phosphorus, magnesium, copper, iodine, manganese and potassium. Enrichment of sorghum with amaranth, spinach and pigeon pea reported to enhance protein, energy, fats, calcium, iron, potassium and zinc of the resultant complement products. Cassava enriched with pigeon pea, Bambara groundnut, moringa and cowpea; wheat with quinoa, lupine, amaranth, orange-fleshed sweet potato, groundnut, mango and spinach; oats with soybean, linseed and premix (moringa leaf powder, fenugreek); teff enriched with pea, sesame, soybean, chickpea and spinach. Fermentation, germination and roasting were the most processing methods used. In conclusion, the enrichment of TCFs with underutilized plant foods combined with simple processing has proven to enhance the nutritional potential, especially protein and key micronutrients. Nutritionally adequate complementary foods could be developed using such food-based approaches to alleviate child malnutrition in SSA sustainably. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-9ff49b797b6d468598eee6c557500ab6 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 2772-5022 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-06-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Applied Food Research |
| spelling | doaj-art-9ff49b797b6d468598eee6c557500ab62025-01-31T05:12:44ZengElsevierApplied Food Research2772-50222025-06-0151100726Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping reviewDiriba Chewaka Tura0Tefera Belachew1Dessalegn Tamiru2Kalkidan Hassen Abate3Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, Institute of Health, Jimma University, Jimma, Ethiopia; Department of Human Nutrition, Wollega University, Nekemte, Ethiopia; Corresponding author.Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, Institute of Health, Jimma University, Jimma, EthiopiaDepartment of Nutrition and Dietetics, Institute of Health, Jimma University, Jimma, EthiopiaDepartment of Nutrition and Dietetics, Institute of Health, Jimma University, Jimma, EthiopiaTraditional complementary foods (TCFs) in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) majorly comprised of starchy foods such as maize, sorghum, wheat, cassava and millet which are energy and nutrient deficient. This review summarizes the existing evidence on the potential of incorporating nutritious underutilized plant foods into TCFs with the application of common processing methods to enhance the nutritional value of the resultant complementary foods in SSA. Online web databases; Google Scholar, Web of Science, Scopus, and PubMed were searched, and the articles retrieved were screened using the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The review revealed that maize; apredominant stable crop used for the formulation of complementary food was enriched with amaranth, moringa and baobab that resulted in the enhancement of protein, iron, calcium, zinc, phosphorus, magnesium, copper, iodine, manganese and potassium. Enrichment of sorghum with amaranth, spinach and pigeon pea reported to enhance protein, energy, fats, calcium, iron, potassium and zinc of the resultant complement products. Cassava enriched with pigeon pea, Bambara groundnut, moringa and cowpea; wheat with quinoa, lupine, amaranth, orange-fleshed sweet potato, groundnut, mango and spinach; oats with soybean, linseed and premix (moringa leaf powder, fenugreek); teff enriched with pea, sesame, soybean, chickpea and spinach. Fermentation, germination and roasting were the most processing methods used. In conclusion, the enrichment of TCFs with underutilized plant foods combined with simple processing has proven to enhance the nutritional potential, especially protein and key micronutrients. Nutritionally adequate complementary foods could be developed using such food-based approaches to alleviate child malnutrition in SSA sustainably.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772502225000368EnrichmentTraditional foodsUnderutilized plant foodsSub-Saharan Africa |
| spellingShingle | Diriba Chewaka Tura Tefera Belachew Dessalegn Tamiru Kalkidan Hassen Abate Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review Applied Food Research Enrichment Traditional foods Underutilized plant foods Sub-Saharan Africa |
| title | Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review |
| title_full | Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review |
| title_fullStr | Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review |
| title_full_unstemmed | Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review |
| title_short | Nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub-Saharan Africa: their nutritional potential and health benefits: A scoping review |
| title_sort | nutritional enrichment of traditional complementary foods using underutilized nutritious plant foods in sub saharan africa their nutritional potential and health benefits a scoping review |
| topic | Enrichment Traditional foods Underutilized plant foods Sub-Saharan Africa |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772502225000368 |
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