We are what we eat - Selected Foods from West Africa
17 January 2011 | Permalink [1]
Understanding the composition of what we eat is fundamental if we wish to study the effect of diet on health and disease. Composition data can also help us assess the energy and nutrient intake of individuals or groups.
Yet there are still many gaps in the collection of this kind of data, especially data that relate to compositional changes that occur when food is cooked or processed prior to eating, which is most of the time. And that is not taking into account the many different ways that food can be cooked and its combination with other ingredients during the preparation of dishes, all of which may affect its composition.
A new publication aims to fill this gap for traditional West African Foods. 
Composition of Selected Foods from West Africa (662 KB) [2] details 173 foods and 30 components. Most of the data collected were for raw food although the nutrient values of cooked foods have also been added.
The data is part of a subset of archival data compiled from March to August 2010 from 7 West African countries, Benin, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Guinea, Niger, Nigeria and Senegal.
Download the publication and technical report here:
Development of a database on the composition of food resources from West African's Food Systems - Technical Report (16 KB)For more information or to request the full set of archival data, contact: 
Nadia Bergamini [4]
Note: The work is a joint effort by FAO [5], INFOODS [6], AFROFOODS and Bioversity International along with WAHO [7] who funded the project.
Similar posts:
- Agricultural Biodiversity for Food and Nutrition security [8]
- Millenium Development Goal 1 Hunger Target - A review of global progress [9]
- A new publication to help understand the food we eat [10]
- Assessing nutritional diversity of cropping systems in African villages [11]
- PhD Fellowship for a national of Benin: Food Security and Nutrition [12]
Web Address of the page:
http://www.bioversityinternational.org/announcements/archived/we_are_what_we_eat_selected_foods_from_west_africa.htmlLinks in this page
- [1] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/index.php?id=3961
- [2] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/fileadmin/bioversity/publications/pdfs/1401_ Composition of selected foods from west Africa.pdf
- [3] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/fileadmin/bioversityDocs/Announcements/Selected_Foods_from_West_Africa/WAHO report food comp jt.doc
- [4] mailto:n.bergamini@cgiar.org
- [5] http://www.fao.org/
- [6] http://www.fao.org/infoods/biodiversity/index_en.stm
- [7] http://www.wahooas.org/?lang=en
- [8] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/announcements/archived/agricultural_biodiversity_for_food_and_nutrition_security.html
- [9] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/announcements/millenium_development_goal_1_hunger_target_a_review_of_global_progress.html
- [10] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/announcements/a_new_publication_to_help_understand_the_food_we_eat.html
- [11] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/announcements/archived/assessing_nutritional_diversity_of_cropping_systems_in_african_villages.html
- [12] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/training/other_fellowships_and_scholarships/phd_fellowship_for_a_national_of_benin_food_security_and_nutrition.html
- [13] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/category/research/nutrition/
- [14] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/category/publications
- [15] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/category/announcements
- [16] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/tag/nutrition
- [17] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/tag/publications
- [18] http://www.bioversityinternational.org/browse_by/tag/west africa