Projecting the Contribution of Provitamin A Maize Biofortification and Other Nutrition Interventions to the Nutritional Adequacy and Cost of Diets in Rural Zimbabwe
These videos have been matched automatically. Contact us if they are not relevant.
These videos have been matched automatically. Contact us if they are not relevant.
View abstract on PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.Biofortified maize with provitamin A (PVA) shows promise for improving vitamin A intake in rural Zimbabwe. However, combining PVA maize adoption with diet diversification is crucial for fully addressing vitamin A deficiency.
Area Of Science
- Agricultural science
- Human nutrition
- Public health
Background
- Vitamin A deficiency remains a significant public health concern in rural Africa.
- Evidence on the effectiveness of biofortified maize (provitamin A maize) in addressing this deficiency is limited.
- This study investigates the potential impact of provitamin A maize adoption in Zimbabwe.
Purpose Of The Study
- To project the impact of provitamin A maize adoption on household vitamin A intake in rural Zimbabwe.
- To model the cost and nutritional composition of diets adequate in vitamin A.
- To assess the feasibility of achieving adequate vitamin A status through dietary changes.
Main Methods
- Household food consumption data collected through weighed food records from 30 rural households.
- Dietary costs estimated using market survey data.
- Linear programming used to model the least-cost diets adequate in vitamin A, incorporating provitamin A maize.
Main Results
- Provitamin A maize adoption is projected to increase the proportion of households meeting at least 50% of their vitamin A requirements from 33% to 50%-70%.
- Achieving adequate vitamin A intake through diet optimization is cost-effective, with estimated daily costs of USD 0.97 (wet season) and USD 0.79 (dry season).
- Even with modest on-farm vitamin A concentrations, significant improvements in intake are anticipated.
Conclusions
- Provitamin A maize adoption offers a substantial improvement in vitamin A intake for rural Zimbabwean households.
- Diet diversification alongside provitamin A maize is recommended for comprehensive vitamin A deficiency control.
- Further research could explore the impact of higher on-station provitamin A concentrations.
These videos have been matched automatically. Contact us if they are not relevant.
These videos have been matched automatically. Contact us if they are not relevant.
Related Concept Videos
Like all living organisms, plants require organic and inorganic nutrients to survive, reproduce, grow and maintain homeostasis. To identify nutrients that are essential for plant functioning, researchers have leveraged a technique called hydroponics. In hydroponic culture systems, plants are grown—without soil—in water-based solutions containing nutrients. At least 17 nutrients have been identified as essential elements required by plants. Plants acquire these elements from the...
Bioavailability refers to the proportion of an unaltered drug that, after administration, enters the systemic circulation and can be distributed to the desired action site. Factors such as gastrointestinal (GI) absorption and liver biotransformation influence the bioavailability of a drug when it is administered orally. When a drug is administered intravenously, it enters the systemic circulation directly; by definition, its bioavailability is assumed to be 100%. The bioavailability of an...
Crop cultivation has a long history in human civilization, with records showing the cultivation of cereal plants beginning at around 8000 BC. This early plant breeding was developed primarily to provide a steady supply of food.
As humans' understanding of genetics advanced, improved crop varieties could be achieved more quickly. Artificial selection could be more directed, and crop varieties enhanced for favorable traits more quickly to produce better, more robust, or more palatable...
In order to produce glucose, plants need to capture sufficient light energy. Many modern plants have evolved leaves specialized for light acquisition. Leaves can be only millimeters in width or tens of meters wide, depending on the environment. Due to competition for sunlight, evolution has driven the evolution of increasingly larger leaves and taller plants, to avoid shading by their neighbors with contaminant elaboration of root architecture and mechanisms to transport water and nutrients.
When a drug is taken orally, it undergoes a journey starting from the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, passing through the portal vein, reaching the liver, and finally entering the systemic circulation. This process involves the absorption of the drug across the GI tract. The liver is the primary site for metabolizing the drug, with some metabolism also occurring in the gut wall. This journey significantly reduces the quantity of the drug that reaches the systemic circulation, a phenomenon known as...
Ribulose 1,5- bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase (RuBisCo) is a critical enzyme that catalyzes carbon dioxide assimilation during photosynthesis. However, it is an inefficient enzyme, having an extremely slow catalytic rate. A typical enzyme can process about a thousand molecules per second; however, RuBisCo fixes only around three-carbon dioxides per second. Photosynthetic cells compensate for this slow rate by synthesizing very high amounts of RuBisCo, making it the most abundant single...