Prospective Role of Indigenous Leafy Vegetables as Functional Food Ingredients
Nyarai Mungofa, July Johannes Sibanyoni, Mpho Edward Mashau, Daniso Beswa
Molecules
Abstract
Indigenous leafy vegetables (ILVs) play a pivotal role in sustaining the lives of many people of low socio-economic status who reside in rural areas of most developing countries. Such ILVs contribute to food security since they withstand harsher weather and soil conditions than their commercial counterparts and supply important nutrients such as dietary fibre, vitamins and minerals. Furthermore, ILVs contain bioactive components such as phenolic compounds, flavonoids, dietary fibre, carotene content and vitamin C that confer health benefits on consumers. Several studies have demonstrated that regular and adequate consumption of vegetables reduces risks of chronic conditions such as diabetes, cancer, metabolic disorders such as obesity in children and adults, as well as cardiovascular disease. However, consumption of ILVs is very low globally as they are associated with unbalanced and poor diets, with being food for the poor and with possibly containing toxic heavy metals. Therefore, this paper reviews the role of ILVs as food security crops, the biodiversity of ILVs, the effects of processing on the bioactivity of ILVs, consumer acceptability of food derived from ILVs, potential toxicity of some ILVs and the potential role ILVs play in the future of eating.
Extracted Claims
2 claims extracted from this paper into the knowledge graph
regular and adequate consumption of vegetables reduces risks of chronic conditions
“Several studies have demonstrated that regular and adequate consumption of vegetables reduces risks of chronic conditions such as diabetes, cancer, metabolic disorders such as obesity in children and ...”
indigenous leafy vegetables (ILVs) contain bioactive components
“ILVs contain bioactive components such as phenolic compounds, flavonoids, dietary fibre, carotene content and vitamin C that confer health benefits on consumers.”