Nigeria: ’100 Percent Cassava Bread Is Possible’
Do you think the 10 percent cassava substitution flour would work?
The inclusion of 10 percent cassava flour in wheat does not make any appreciable difference in terms of the texture, taste or the quality of bread in any way.
Can you explain how your agency was able to include 10 percent flour in producing bread?
The research started way back in the early 1970′s in the Federal Institute of Research, Oshodi (FIRO). But because of recent development, the need to have composite flour to reduce the importation of wheat has always been paramount with the FIRO and a lot of work has been done in this area using cassava and cereals testing to explore their viability.
Cassava particularly can be included in flour for up to 30 percent for making bread and would not make any appreciable difference as well as in other baked items and confectionery.
Is there a possibility of making bread with 100 percent Cassava bread?
Yes, it depends on the culture and it would not be the conventional bread. You know culture affects our taste. Food is a cultural thing and you can make people adapt to the taste of what you want.
Bread was not our food initially but it has been brought into our diet and produced in a particular form and anything that deviates from that form may not be seen as bread and that is why we are gradually introducing the cassava flour so that the original taste, texture and nature of the bread is not different and it tastes just like 100 percent wheat bread.
There are countries that are using higher composites in the bakery and this is culturally acceptable to them. So far in Nigeria, we still depend on our conventional bread and a far deviation from that may not be acceptable but cassava is a very good alternative.
How much are we expecting to cut as cost of importation of wheat if we substitute 10 percent cassava?
It is not actually the effect of costing that we are looking at, but the fact is we would open a market for cassava farmers to earn huge income because we would need about 300,000 metric tons of cassava annually and to get that quantity of cassava, jobs would be created, the value chain would be developed.
It is going to encourage agriculture and the planting of cassava because it is now a business that can generate huge income for the farmer, we would have the intermediate manufactures that would feed the flour millers and those that would export. It is going to be an active chain and cassava is much cheaper than wheat flour thereby creating jobs and the whole idea is to make us food sufficient in our own country.
Apart from the reduction in cost of bread, there would be saving for foreign exchange, we would be able to create jobs, create wealth and eat our own crop from our own land.
How has the target market reacted to bread mixed with 10 percent cassava?
We hope that the stakeholders would ensure the success of this initiative because we have no choice if the government is moving in that direction so everybody should be onboard. We thank God that government is rising up to this challenge at such a critical moment through the Federal Ministry of Agriculture.
At FIRO, we have done quite lot of work and of training both at the high and the low levels. We have demonstrated different baking types from the mud oven, basic complimentary baking technique was demonstrated, we have demonstrated with highly sophisticated baking equipment as well across states.
Even the local commercial bakeries are already baking with 10 percent cassava and the result has been the same.
Do you think cassava inclusion can be sustained for the next 10 years?
Yes, it can be sustained forever. Cassava is our crop of relative advantage. We are the world’s leading producers of cassava. We can cultivate cassava with minimal equipment because it’s a rugged crop so it can be sustained because availability is not a problem.
Some stakeholders say that including 10 percent is too hasty. Are you of the same opinion?
At FIRO, we use high quality cassava bread to produce bread because we have done a number of researches on cassava flour and some of the items it can be used to produce.
How do you intend to use your agency to help farmers key into cassava processing?
This issue of cassava is not new, we have been talking about it for quite some time now and everything has been put in place to make it work. The only thing that was left is putting it into law and that is the genesis of the 10 percent policy and once it is passes into law, then everybody is bound by it but when there is no law, there is no enforcement.
Is there provision for closing our border to the importing processed cassava?
