The University has recorded another milestone in addition to the previous achievements it had made over the years. This time around, FUNAAB, in partnership with the Natural Resources Institute (NRI), University of Greenwich, United Kingdom, have been selected as the winner of the $500,000 Cassava Innovation Challenge grant, alongside the needed technical assistance, to test and market a polythene bag with an in-built technology that would keep cassava fresh, for at least, eight days after harvesting. The announcement was made at the first All African Post-harvest Congress, held in Nairobi, Kenya.

According to the Director, Directorate of Grants Management of the University, Professor Kolawole Adebayo, The Rockefeller Foundation, in association with Dalberg and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), put forward a challenge to get an innovation that could extend the shelf-life of cassava. He said cassava remained one of the major staple foods in Africa and being a starchy food crop, it  deteriorates very fast if unprocessed within 24 to 72 hours after harvesting, hence, the need for proper preservation. Professor Adebayo, who noted that two different perspectives, previously being considered for the preservation of the crop included processing and that as soon as it was harvested, it becomes something more profitable like garri, cassava flour (elubo) or fufu, adding that once that was done, there was a limit to the kind of product that could be derived from it.

On the other hand, he pointed out that improving the logistics of delivery from the farm to processing was also considered, so as to save as much time as possible, but added that this also had its challenge, as time was lost in harvesting, parking, transporting and offloading products, stressing that breakdown of the vehicle or traffic, could not be ruled out and “once you harvest the cassava, if you don’t use within 24 hours, it starts to lose starch, it starts to lose quality and so, the colour of the product you make from it will not be as white and the Potential of Hydrogen (pH) will be high. Therefore, there is a limit to the kind of product you make from it, and after three to five days, it becomes practically useless for anything else”.
The Post-harvest Expert explained that this challenge (perishability), necessitated looking at what really could be done to keep harvested cassava in its fresh form for about a week or eight days, so that it does not get spoilt most, especially, considering the fact that Nigeria is the largest producer of cassava and is also the largest consumer of the crop. Following the challenge, Professor Adebayo disclosed that more than 600 applications from 32 countries submitted their ideas on how to solve this problem; of short shelf-life for cassava, due to lack of preservation technology. A panel of judges from around the world, including Nigerian cassava experts, recommended the grant, based on The Rockefeller Foundation criteria for innovation.

Speaking on the technology, Professor Adebayo said “it is a simple bag. The science of it is easy to understand; as it is being used with other commodities, whereby if you get a particular type of bag that has a particular type of micro-environment, any living plant kept in that bag will remain fresh, so long as the bag is not opened for up to eight days or at least, more than one week. Now, at the laboratory level, this has been demonstrated, but at the commercial level, nobody has ever used it. And there are a number of reasons why people have not used it in the business of cassava processing. It is because it is not a regulated business. So, you cannot say that you should only sell cassava roots in this bag. There is no such regulation anywhere. So, that makes it difficult then”.

The Director said what was now done, was to take the bagging technology, which had been developed many years ago and do it in varying sizes. “It is very simple and requires one, who knows the chemistry of growth and preservation. This was the expertise that NRI has brought into the collaboration. We have been collaborating with NRI for 30 years now and we have a lot of knowledge on the transactions that take place in the cassava sector, which will influence the uptake of this bag. We will need additional partners to make this work. We need people, who have the facilities to make bags, we will have to introduce the science, to making those bags a preservative kind of bag and then, we need the value chain, to market the bag for those who will use it. So, over the next one to three years, we will be working on these, using the funds from this global challenge that The Rockefeller Foundation has provided as leverage on how to commercialise this knowledge that has been made available through this collaboration. So, this is the technology and if it works in Nigeria, which is the largest producer of cassava, then it probably will work anywhere in the world”.

Explaining the benefits that could be derived from the grant, Professor Adebayo said the collaboration between two universities, anywhere in the world, was always an advantage and a win-win situation. For FUNAAB, he disclosed that “many of our scientists would gain insight into the science of cassava preservation”. Describing this achievement as one that is worth celebrating, Professor Adebayo stated that “to be the applicant that was selected (FUNAAB and University of Greenwich), out of 600 applications, is not a small feat. Actually, this is where universities in Nigeria or Africa are different from European universities because now, the University of Greenwich describes itself as a world-leading institution on cassava research. Why can’t we do that? We should also celebrate successes and then build on those successes. Once we can do it for cassava, maybe we can do it for yam, sweet potato, carrot and onion as we have several of our scientists working on all these other crops who can learn from these opportunity and then use it”. The invention, which won FUNAAB the grant, NRICassavabag, would be of benefit to about 500 million people in Africa, who rely on cassava for food security and nutrition, as nearly 30 million small holder farmers grow over 50 million tonnes annually, which amounts to 20 per cent of the world’s population. Meanwhile, the polythene bag would be available in a variety of sizes, for different value chain actors.

Expressing displeasure at the several bottlenecks that researchers in the country face, Professor Adebayo disclosed that “the environment that we work in has not been very helpful. Over the years, we have built the profile of FUNAAB, as a University, to compete with other universities”. He further called for a review of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) policy, noting that it would discourage researchers from grants writing, as the funds would be mopped up, the projects not being realised and would eventually discourage many organisations from financing grants in the country, because such funds would not be readily accessible for the researchers, to achieve their goals and targets.