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Vegetable cucurbits for nutrition-sensitive home and school gardens in Southeast Asia
Project
Project code: MRI-OG-08-KA-722-1060AVRDC
Contract period: 01.03.2014
- 31.08.2015
Purpose of research: Applied research
Ensuring adequate, safe and nutritious food for all its citizen is a high priority and longstanding agenda in the framework of ASEAN community building. In this aspect, however, it is important to distinguish between having sufficient food and having adequate nutrition. Micronutrient deficiency or hidden hunger affects more than 2 billion people worldwide (FAO 2008) and can exist in populations even where ghe food supply is adequate in terms of meeting energy requirements. Although these people are not considered hungry, their diets may be grossly deficient in one or more micronutrients.Cucurbits, specifically bitter gourd (Momordica charantia L.) and pumpkin (Cucurbita moschata L.) are an integral component of vegetable gardens in Asia. bitter gourd fruits are rich source of beta-carotene, vitamin C, folic acid, MG, P and K (Yuwai et al. 1991). Pumpkins abound in alpha- and beta-carotenes and lutein and a rich source of dietary fiber. Bitter gourd and pumpkin breeding by the private seed sector has focused on developing hybrids particularly for larger scale commercial production with horticultural attributes that are not necessarily suitable to be grown in home and school gardens, where space often is limited. the cucurbit breeding program of AVRDC-The World Vegetable Center has already developed advanced breeding lines of bitter gourd and pumpkin of different market types, suitable for vegetable gardens in Asia. this project aims to evaluate the horticultural and nutritional traits of these advanced breeding lines, meant for homestead production and consumption, in collaboration with Max Rubner-Institut (MRI), the Federal Research Institute of Nutrition and Food in Germany. The project will harness MRI´s strength on quality, health and safety aspects of vegetables using state of the art analytical, as well as non-invasive methods. The Department of Safety and Quality of Fruit and Vegetables at the MRI works in the area of fresh fruit and vegetables and also carries out research on non-invasive analysis techniques with less emphasis on quantification of single food components concentration, but more in correlation spectral data to sensory and/or nutritional properties of fruits. This non-invasive technique will applied in the project to bitter gourd and pumpkin with the aim to develop a method which allows a predication on the overall nutritional value within the breeding lines. Furthermore MRI will provide aq standard chemical composition analysis of the fruits (lipids, protein, sugar,minerals) as well as a quantitative analysis of important health-promoting compounds such as bitter-tasting saponins and carotenoids. These analyses will be performed using modern analytical equipment like liquid-chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS). Especially the analysis of bitter-tasting components will be emphasized due to a lack on detailed information in this field. the comprehensive evaluation of both institutions will result in recommending the promising lines for multi-location trials in vegetable gardens in various Asian countries, for adoption.
Section overview
Subjects
- Plant Breeding
- Horticulture
- Physiology of Nutrition
Framework programme
Funding programme
Excutive institution
MRI - Department of Safety and Quality of Fruit and Vegetables (MRI-OG)
