Adewale Oparinde

Availability, production, and consumption of crops biofortified by plant breeding: current evidence and future potential

Biofortification is the process of increasing the density of vitamins and minerals in a crop through plant breeding—using either conventional methods or genetic engineering—or through agronomic practices. Over the past 15 years, conventional breeding efforts have resulted in the development of varieties of several staple food crops with significant levels of the three micronutrients most limiting in diets: zinc, iron, and vitamin A. More than 15 million people in developing countries now grow and consume biofortified crops. Evidence from nutrition research shows that biofortified varieties provide considerable amounts of bioavailable micronutrients, and consumption of these varieties can improve micronutrient deficiency status among target populations. Farmer adoption and consumer acceptance research shows that farmers and consumers like the various production and consumption characteristics of biofortified varieties, as much as (if not more than) popular conventional varieties, even in the absence of nutritional information. Further development and delivery of these micronutrient‐rich varieties can potentially reduce hidden hunger, especially in rural populations whose diets rely on staple food crops. Future work includes strengthening the supply of and the demand for biofortified staple food crops and facilitating targeted investment to those crop–country combinations that have the highest potential nutritional impact.

Characterizing Consumers’ Preference for an Iron-Biofortified Bean Variety in Northwest Guatemala: A Sensory Evaluation

The process of generating new crops varieties with higher micronutrient content or biofortification, could be a complementary strategy to fight against micronutrient deficiencies mainly in rural areas. Its success depends on whether those biofortified cultivars are accepted and consumed by target populations. Consumer behavior economics argues that consumer preferences for specific product characteristics are determined by socioeconomic, cultural and biological aspects. Based on that, this study aims to establish which socioeconomic and demographic characteristics predict respondents’ preferences for the sensory attributes in an iron bean variety compared to a traditional one, and the role that information and repetition on nutritional characteristics plays on forming those preferences. In August 2013, 360 rural families were surveyed in northwest Guatemala for this purpose. We found that the iron-fortified variety is slightly preferred compared to the conventional one regarding major significant factors as color, size, taste, and cooking time. While there is no homogeneity in socioeconomic characteristics defining the preferences for these attributes characteristics related to bean consumption, bean production status and market orientation of the respondents or households plays an important role on defining those preferences. Characteristics as age, education level, and poverty level do not influence those preferences, indicating that the beliefs and revealed preferences are mostly culturally formed and market related more than influenced by socio-demographic characteristics. Cluster analysis shows three clusters: fully accepters, slightly accepters and indifferent. Fully accepters are mainly wealthier women less related with bean activities. Slightly accepters are mainly men with higher education and traditionally not purchasing beans in the market. The indifferent are bean consumers and producers with less education and a higher probability of being under the poverty line Nutritional information does not seem to play an important role in consumer preference formation, however its repetition does, especially when repeated trice to men.