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Nutritional Values of Digitaria exilis

The nutritional value of decorticated fonio is about 1'470 KJ and for whitened fonio 1'430 KJ per 100 gram (1).The nutritional value of its product is very high without suffering from taste (2). It offers a good source of fibres and phytonutrients (2). Fonio shows generally mineral contents that are in the range of other cereals (Table 1). But it contains much more sulphur than other cereals and they are also mainly concentrated in the grain and not in the husk (1). Methionine, which is built up with sulphur, is accumulated in fonio twice the amount compared to corn or millet and three times compared to rice (1). Some of the minerals are mostly concentrated in the husk which are therefore lost while hulling (1). The remaining fatty acids in the decorticated grain are mainly unsaturated fats like linoleic and oleic acid (1). The most present saturated fat is palmitic acid (1). It has been reported that Digitaria exilis is an optimal food for people having diabetic problems (5). The sterols found in this plant can lead to an 8-15% lower LDL cholesterol level (5). Its dietary fibre is also important to avoid cardiovascular diseases and hypertension (5).

Source: (1)

Source: (1)

Fonio and gluten

The coeliac disease is an intolerance to a certain prolamine, so called gluten in wheat, which can cause chronic small intestinal problems (2,3). Fonio is closer to sorghum and rice than to wheat, and therefore it does not contain the sequence of amino acids that cause this intolerance (1). Fonio is therefore an interesting crop for people suffering from coeliac disease (2).

Hulling and Whitening

Harvested seeds, so called paddy fonio can not be eaten (1). Therefore seeds need to be processed by hulling or additionally by a second process step the whitening (1). Traditionally African women process the hulling with mortars and wooden sticks (1). For breaking the husks they successively peel the grain in the mortar with shaking the grains in between (1). A further continuous peeling removes then the ban consisting of pericarp and germ (4).



References: (1) Le fonio, une cèrèale africaine. Jean-François Cruz, Famoi Béavogui, avec la collaboration de Djibril Dramé. Agricultures tropicales en poche, éditions quae, CTA Presses agronomiques de Gembloux, 2011. (2) de Lourdes Moreno, M., Comino, I., Sousa, C., 2014. Alternative Grains as Potential Raw Material for Gluten- Free Food Development in The Diet of Celiac and Gluten- Sensitive Patients, Austin Journal of Nutrition and Food Sciences. (3) Ludvigsson, J.F., Leffler, D.A., Bai, J.C.,F, Biagi, F., Fasano, A., Green, P., Hadjivassiliou, M., Kaukinen, K., Kelly, C.P., Leonard, J.N., Aslaksen Lundin, N.E., Murray, J.A., Sanders, D.S., Walker, M.M., Zingone, F., Ciacci, C., 2013. The Oslo definitions for coeliac disease and related terms. Gut 62:43-52. (4) http://fonio.cirad.fr/en/the_plant (5) Jideani I. A., 2012. Digitaria exilis (acha/fonio), Digitaria iburua (iburu/fonio) and Eluesine coracana (tamba/finger millet) – Non-conventional cereal grains with potentials. Scientific Research and Essays Vol. 7(45), pp. 3834 -3843. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sophgoat (talk • contribs) 13:47, 11 November 2015 (UTC)