NIGERIA has one of the highest rates of infant mortality in the world. One in seven children dies before their fifth birthday, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). More worrisome is the fact that 13 per cent of Nigeria children are malnourished. This informed the assertion of the United Nations Standing Committee on Nutrition that malnutrition is the largest contributor to non-communicable diseases in the world. These diseases can affect the brain, the health and the respiratory system, but the most common are gastrointestinal disease.
Against this backdrop, the first 1,000 days of a child are crucial because this period determines what a child may likely become in the future. Therefore, no normal child can grow into a healthy, strong and happy adult without the intake of dietary diversification, The Nation gathered.
The cognitive and physical damage caused by malnutrition during the 1,000-day-window between a woman’s pregnancy and her child’s second birthday, is severe and often irreversible, with profound consequences for a child’s future.
Buttressing this assertion, Prof. Ngozi Nnam, the President, Nutrition Society of Nigeria, pointed out that this period is when the physical and mental development of the child is developed to achieve full potential with window of opportunity which can have a profound impact on a child’s ability to grow, learn and rise out of poverty is formed.
Nutrition experts say breastfeeding initiated immediately after birth and continued until two years with appropriate complementary feeding has both short and long-term impact on the health and nutrition of a child. But the big question is, how many nursing mothers can afford to breast feed her baby for two years in Nigeria of nowadays?
However, in order to bridge the wide gap of nourishing food that will discourage malnutrition caused by poverty and penury, a recipe in terms of appropriate complementary nutrition for a Nigerian child has surfaced in Orange Fleshed Sweet Potato (OFSP), The Nation authoritatively gathered.
In a fact-finding mission to verify the nutrient value in sweet potato in general and OFSP in particular, this reporter was at the National Root Crops Research Institute at Umudike, Abia State, Federal Polytechnic, Offa, Kwara State and the International Potato Centre, Abuja.
Since sweet potato is one of the root crops that can grow well virtually in all the states of the federation, according to experts, if it is well harnessed and made available as a daily menu to rural communities, with time, malnutrition in Nigerian child will become history.
Speaking to The Nation about the nutrient value of sweet potato, one of the notable sweet potato breeders in the country and a researcher at the National Root Crops Research Institute, Umudike, Abia State, Mr. Solomon Oluwafemi Afuape, said that the nutrient value in sweet potato is so enormous that if it is well tapped, Nigerian child will not suffer from malnutrition again.
Afuape, who took this reporter round the sweet potato research field at Umudike, said: “Whether it is white, purple, yellow or orange, every sweet potato is a bundle of vitamins and minerals. It contains Vitamin B6, Vitamin C and other minerals. But the OFSP is orange in colour and tastes like carrots; it is so because of the carotenoid it contains. It has beta- carotene in abundance. This is what our body converts to Vitamin A.”
According to him, the beta- carotene helps the brain of a child to develop; it also assists in boosting the immune system so that the body of the child can fight diseases better. “It also has in abundance what smoothens the skin; in fact, it is the artificial one that the women are robbing on the face to make it smooth. It is also a neutraliser of some substance inhaled to the body and makes it harmless. It makes the skin to flourish and be alive.”
The researcher pointed out that” the richness of Vitamin A in beta-carotene also makes the eye to be sharper as we grow. Someone who eats sweet potato regularly does not have chances of having cancer-related diseases.”
He explained that the latest varieties of OFSP that are been duplicated by some dedicated farmers in the country are ‘Mother delight and King J varieties’.
The Nation intensive investigations revealed that this vitamin if present in a child’s food shortly before weaning, will go a long way to make the baby healthy and full of life with a strong immune system built round her against diseases.
Speaking in the same vein, a nutritionist at Garki Hospital, Abuja, Miss Yemisi Olowookere, underscoring the importance of sweet potato to nursing mothers advised them to include it in their daily menu because it is good for cardiovascular health.
Olowookere explains that potato is a rich source of flavonoid anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals, and dietary fibre that are essential for optimal health.
According to her, the tuber contains no saturated fats or cholesterol and it is a rich source of dietary fibre, anti-oxidants, vitamins, and minerals. “Potatoes are good source of Vitamin C, it helps ward off cold and flu viruses as well as bone and tooth formation, digestion, and blood cell formation.”
The nutritionist pointed out that sweet potato helps to accelerate wound healing, produces collagen which helps maintain skin’s youthful elasticity and is essential in helping us cope with stress. “It even appears to help protect our body against toxins that may be linked to cancer.”
She explained that sweet potato also contains Vitamin D which is critical for immune system and overall health. “Vitamin D plays an important role in our energy level, moods, and helps to build healthy bones, heart nerves, skin and teeth and it supports the thyroid gland.”
Investigation by The Nation revealed that most nursing mothers could not afford giving their children the needed nutrients due to poverty. Malnutrition, according to experts, is one of the world’s most serious but least addressed problems. It claims the lives of three million children each year, yet it is almost entirely preventable. Close to 200 million children suffer from chronic nutritional deprivation that leaves them permanently stunted -unable to fulfill their genetic potential to grow and thrive – and keeps families, communities and countries locked in a cycle of hunger and poverty.
More worrisome and pathetic is the fact that majority of mothers do not practise breast feeding because they are not fully aware of the benefits of breastfeeding and more importantly, they do not understand the long-term adverse impact of non-breast feeding of their babies. The few that are aware are carried away by the hustling and bustling of economic survival at the expense of their kids.
Perhaps against this backdrop, last year November 2014 , over 190 governments gathered in Rome for the International Conference on Nutrition to discuss and advance policy options and strategies to improve food system and people’s diet in order to more effectively address the world’s major nutrition challenges.
The conference that launched the first ever Global Nutrition Report, which presents a comprehensive view of global and country- level progress against malnutrition, regretted that one out of every two people on the planet is undernourished, micronutrient deficient, obese or a combination of all three, adding that all hands should be on deck to address the issue.
The Nation gathered that the importance the country attached to the OFSP made her to go all out to exploit all its wealth and health benefits by naming the project as Rainbow Project, which incorporated all stakeholders in sweet potato value chain, the potato farmers, researchers and processors.
Speaking to this reporter on the objective of the Rainbow Project, the Project leader, Dr Olapeju Phorbee, said the idea behind the project was centered on health and wealth creation.”The project was to provide the needed Vitamin A which is deficient in pregnant women and children in the country and make it available to them at their door step in terms of OFSP.”
According to her, the OFSP has been tested, tasted and found suitable, adding that there is a pilot scheme which targeted some selected state where vines are duplicated. These include Ebonyi, Osun, Kaduna, Benue, Kwara, Nasarawa/FCT.
Phorbee explained that OFSP is rich in Vitamin A, which is particularly good for a child in its 1,000 days of its existence. It will give the baby a high immune system that will assist to wade off diseases which children are facing at this crucial period.”
She pointed out that due to the high nutrition value in OFSP, the project keyed into the Osun State government school feeding project, which the state is operating to give the children the needed nutrition at such a tender age so that they will be able to build high immune system in their body.
“We went round the state to educate and train the food vendors the need to include OFSP in the daily menu of the school feeding system; this is a right step at the right time. This will give the opportunity to the school children the right diet that will hasten their growth and discourage all these preventable diseases.
She said that by the time the project has a complete circle, “we would be able to produce other food items from the OFSP like potato garri, flour, bread and potato chips. This will go to a greater length to assist Nigerian children to grow and have sound health.”
The project leader, who encourages other states in the country to duplicate what is going on in Osun, said this will give opportunity to eradicate malnutrition which is ravaging the lives of Nigerian school children.
Corroborating Phorbee’s assertion on the importance of sweet potato, Mr. Emmanuel Ajayi, a food scientist, said “Sweet potatoes are naturally sweet-tasting, but their natural sugars are slowly released into the bloodstream, helping to ensure a balanced and regular source of energy.”
Ajayi said it is not just sweet to the taste but the value is one of the highest among the root-vegetables categories, adding that sweet potatoes are a good source of magnesium, which is the relaxation and anti-stress mineral.
He explained: “Sweet potatoes help in red and white blood cell production, resistance to stress, proper immune functioning and the metabolising of protein, among other things.”
According to him, there are other products which sweet potato can be used for and which can be duplicated in a commercial purpose and it will be available to all households at giveaway prices, “such products are potato bread, chips, cake, flour, among others.”
As a processor, who had done a lot of extensive research on what sweet potato could be turned to, Mr. Abraham Oyeyemi Idowu, the Head of Department of Food Science, the Federal Polytechnics Offa, Kwara State, said sweet potato is all rounder in terms of nutrient provision.
Idowu, who said that the school had been working on sweet potato since 2005, noted that it was the former Rector of the school, Dr Rasak Bello, who saw it in China and challenged the department to produce potato bread with only 10 per cent of wheat. Since we have sweet potato production in Offa and its environ, we went into action.
He said from that experiment in 2005, the school has not rested on its oars to research deep into what sweet potato can be turned to.”The recent variety called OFSP is so rich in Vitamins A, C, and D that it was used to produce a lot of products like potato flour (pie, scot egg chips) juice, jam, potato corn vita, OFSP sorghum-vita, golden corn and custard at the polytechnics.
According to him, if all these products are duplicated and commercialised, it will assist nursing mothers and their babies to have good and nourishing intake.”The issue of our children developing a disease like malnutrition will be a thing of the past.”
He said if the school feeding project that is currently going on in Osun State could be duplicated throughout the country, the project might have succeeded in providing the necessary diet to millions of Nigerians children and could have saved the country from children diseases and stunted growth among our children.
Admonishing the importance of nutrient inherent in sweet potato, Idowu noted that about 142 sweet potato vendors in Offa were given training on OFSP and how they can package it better and make it available to some of the school children in the vicinity, adding that if the state can also imbibe the school feeding system, it would go a long way to make nourishing diet available to children of school age and avoid future diseases.
