THE commercial production of cassava wheat bread was first given a go-ahead after the former President, Olusegun Obasanjo, visited the Federal Institute of Industrial Research Oshodi (FIIRO) on March 22nd 2004 where he sampled the bread and developed interest in promoting it.
Thereafter, he mandated flour millers and bakers to incorporate at least 10 per cent cassava content into wheat flour. But due to financial constraints, nothing much was done in that regard till the current administration of President Goodluck Jonathan started to empower the stakeholders by way of training and funding.
The first time I came across cassava bread and other cassava confectionaries was at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture [IITA] Ibadan in 1993. The texture of the products was okay, the taste delicious and the look inviting just like other products that are wheat flour-based.
But what I could not determine or confirm then was the percentage of cassava flour that was added to the wheat flour or if the products were baked completely with cassava flour.
My subsequent sighting and eating of cassava wheat bread was at FIIRO office where the bread and other confectionaries are baked daily and sold to staff and visitors.
This time, I was able to ascertain that only 20% of cassava flour was added in the baking of the cassava wheat bread.
The bread, which is touted to be highly nourishing, is sold for N200. It looks exactly like the normal bread in the shops and also tastes as such. If one does not read the prints on the wrapping, one would not know it contains cassava flour.
A lot has been written, debated, and said about the usage of High quality Cassava Flour [HQCF]; how the federal government will save foreign exchange by not importing wheat flour and how more employments will be created, among other things.
However, the man on the street is not interested in the policies and what the government is able to save in terms of foreign exchange or the industrial development through the creation of Small Medium Entrepreneurs Cassava processors.
The consumer wants to know how he will benefit from the inclusion of cassava flour in his bread and other confectionaries. Is it going to make the prices of those goods cheaper? Again, what are the health benefits?
Will the price of bread come down, especially in these times of economic hardship where the average family spends about N500 daily on bread alone for breakfast not to mention the cost of milk and other things that go with bread?
Bread is one of the commonest foods in most countries because it is a ready meal, easily accessible, enjoyed plain or with accompaniments, therefore is the first choice for most families as they leave home in the morning either to school or work.
Already, bakers have started substituting 10% wheat flour for cassava flour in their bread making but consumers are yet to feel the impact in the prices of bread.
According to Dr. Mrs. Gloria N.Elemo, the Director General and Chief Executive Officer of FIIRO, the agency that has been championing the processing and usage of HQCF, saying that the inclusion of 20% HQCF in baking will reduce the cost of bread by about 15 per cent and will bring further reduction in the long run.
The FIIRO DG, in a paper she delivered during the NISER research seminar titled ‘The prospects and challenges of cassava bread and confectionaries production in Nigeria’, stated that at 10% level of substituting wheat flour for cassava flour, the price of bread could reduce by about 7%.
The above evaluation, she noted, is based on price/ton of N75,000.00 for HQCF as against price/ton of N140,000.00 for wheat flour.
But what is worrisome is that even though some professionals and multinational companies have started the mandatory 10% substitution of wheat flour for cassava flour which is cheaper, the price of bread has remained the same. Consumers have not felt any positive impact.
At FIIRO headquaters at Oshodi, for instance, the agency you would have expected to lead by example, the cost of cassava wheat bread that weighs about 950g is N200, meaning that if it is produced for the open market with the cost of distribution it may cost about N220 to N250 each.
Wheat-based bread that weighs about the same thing from other producers like UAC, UTC, Leventis, Food Concepts, Big Treat etcetera costs N200 to N220 in the open market.
Acknowledging that the cost of producing cassava wheat bread is cheaper, Prince Jacob Adejorin, the Lagos State Chairman, Association of Master Bakers and Caterers of Nigeria, noted that the cheaper cost of the production is yet to affect the price of bread.
Prince Adejorin said in an interview that “the cost of 50kg of wheat flour is N7,000 while the cost of HQCF of the same size is N5,000 and when we substitute 10% of the wheat flour with cassava flour it becomes cheaper.”
Prince Adejorin further explained that though he produces cassava wheat bread and confectionaries, his prices have remained the same as “I use about a bag of 50kg of wheat flour daily and go as far as Ogun State to source for it.”
“With time, as we have enough cassava market, consumers will feel the impact of the cassava flour in the reduced bread price, but, for now, we do not have enough cassava flour,” he declared.
Reminding him that in the association’s professional recent magazine, over 50 names and addresses were listed as cassava flour millers and dealers in Nigeria, he responded that “regrettably when you approach them to buy they tell you there is no flour.”
Dr. Elemo had also noted that the potential challenge is in the supply of Highly Quality Cassava Flour to the flour millers.
Explaining, she said that in 2005 after the policy on 10% cassava content in bread took off, due to shortage of cassava flour to the millers, the federal government had to revert to 5% inclusion when it was obvious that the flour millers could not get enough supply from processors.
By 2007, many of the flour millers and bakers abandoned the inclusion policy as they could not get enough HQCF resulting in the closure of many HQCF factories.
However, many of them have opened again due to the current government’s efforts and interest in cassava bread through favourable incentive schemes for processors and bakers as well.
The federal government said it plans to spend about N10billion to strengthen various organs that would help scale up cassava flour in the country.
The Minister of Agriculture, Akinwumi Adesina, said that the scaling up of cassava supply would ensure a gradual replacement of wheat flour in bread by 50 per cent within the next three to five years. He added that the federal government had already, among other things, provided N9.9billon under the cassava bread fund to enable the production chain scale up to the target.
On the health benefits to consumers, scientifically, it’s been proved that cassava wheat bread and confectionaries have no health and nutritional disadvantage.
Cassava flour is predominantly carbohydrate with minimal quantities of other minerals and dietary fibre.
