Sustainable valorisation of local resources to promote food security: palm wine & tiger nuts

The need to utilize valuable natural resources and turn them into valuable food products is rising both for economic as well as sustainable purposes. The utilization of valuable local products helps deal with pollution, with scarcity of natural resources while also being able to provide possible alternative solutions to traditional foods and beverages, that help fight the problem of food insecurity in some areas of the globe. This work explores the utilization of palm wine and tiger nut “milk”, to, through a fermentative process, obtain a safe alcoholic beverage, free from microbial contamination. This will allow to valorize natural resources while also preventing food insecurity. The raw materials were obtained from Nigeria, and appropriately prepared and stored until further utilization. In brief, the sugar syrup was prepared by dissolution of fermentable sugar (sucrose), heating and cooling processes, while the tiger nut “milk” was obtained from the nuts by soaking, blending and filtering. The preparation of the fermented beverage was carried out until reaching an alcohol content between 5 and 8%. The proximate composition of the product was determined following standard chemical methodologies. Microbial as well as sensorial analyses were also conducted. The results showed that, based on all the analyses made, including proximate composition, physicochemical properties, microbiological analyses and sensory evaluation, the sensory scores confirm that the palm wine analogue obtained competes favorably with the natural palm wine. In this way it can be used as a valuable replacement, while also exploring the utilization of alternative resources.

Keywords

Sustainable food Food resources Valorization

URI

http://hdl.handle.net/10400.19/9410

Citation

Onyeodili A, Okafor G, Okoyeuzu C, Nduka O, Okechukwu Q, Hassani M, Juchniewicz S, Leicht K, Okpala C, Korzeniowska M,, Guiné R. (2025) Sustainable valorisation of local resources to promote food security: palm wine & tiger nuts . Abstract Book of 5th International Workshop “Towards Zero Pollution”, Viseu, Portugal, pp. 31.