Francis Omujal^1,2*, Peter Ochan^1,3, Paul Okullo^2,5, Patrick E Ogwang^2,4, Clement Akais Okia^2,6, Sheila Natukunda³ and William Olupot²

¹Natural Chemotherapeutics Research institute, Ministry of Health, Kampala, Uganda
²Nature and Livelihoods, Kampala, Uganda
³School of Food Technology, Nutrition and Bioengineering, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda
⁴Department of Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine, Mbarara University of Science and Technology, Mbarara, Uganda
⁵National Agricultural Research Organizations, Nabuin Agricultural Research and Development Institute, Soroti, Uganda
⁶Muni University, Arua, Ugand

*Corresponding Author: Francis Omujal, Natural Chemotherapeutics Research institute, Ministry of Health, Kampala, Uganda.

Received: November 01, 2022; Published: December 07, 2022

Abstract

Nutritional analyses of food have mainly focused on determining the nutritional composition. Few concentrate on their nutritional value. This study provisionally classified ten wild edible fruit types (WEF) growing in the Teso sub region in eastern Uganda by their nutritional value. Fruit pulps of Carissa spinarum, Saba comorensis, Sclerocarya birrea. Flacourtia indica, Vitex doniana, Strychnos spinosa Ximenia americana., Vangueria infausta, Vitellaria paradoxa and Physalis minima. were analyzed for proximate and mineral composition, and their recommended dietary allowance (RDA) per 100g were calculated. Hierarchical Cluster Analysis (HLA), Principal Components Analysis (PCA), and Canonical Discriminant Analysis (CDA) were used to classify the fruits based on their nutrient compositions. Then the pulps were profiled for nutrients composition using the nutritious food index (NFI) model. The HLA returned two and three clusters at linkage distances of <25 and 15 respectively, showing that these clusters were nutritionally distinct from each other. The PCA returned five components which accounted for 86.27% of the variability in the nutritional composition. The variability in Principle Component I was explained primarily by differences in moisture, total energy and total carbohydrates and that in Principle Component 2 mainly by dissimilarities in amounts of Zn and Fe. Canonical Discriminant Analysis (CDA) generated three Canonical Discriminant Functions (CDF), the first of which explained 99.2% of the total variation of the clusters with total carbohydrate and potassium quantities as the major contributors (Wilks’ lambda: Λ = 0.173 and 0.041 for carbohydrates and potassium respectively). The nutrient density profiles had F. indica and P. minima as the top-ranked with their overall nutritional values largely contributed by protein, potassium and dietary fibre. These results suggest that classification of WEFs based on nutritional composition is possible, and these could be used in their promotion among communities in public health and nutrition education.

Keywords: Indigenous Fruits; Nutrient Profile; Nutritional Composition; Hierarchical Dendrogram Clustering; Principal Component Analysis; Provisional Classification

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Citation

Citation: Francis Omujal., et al. “Provisional Classification of Wild Edible Fruits Based on their Nutrient Profiles". Acta Scientific Nutritional Health 7.1 (2023): 39-48.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2023 Francis Omujal., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.