Cassava Bagasse to Xanthan Gum

The use of composite and wheat-less flours for bread making is a very recent development across the globe owing to some economic, social and health reasons. The incidence of celiac disease, which is a gluten intolerance disease, has made food scientists in Europe and Southern America to search for gluten-free flours instead of wheat flour for bread making. However, in the developing countries such as in the sub-Saharan Africa, research efforts are devoted to partial substitution of wheat flour for bread baking purposes, in order to reduce the huge expenditure on wheat importation and to increase the utilization of locally available food crops. 

Hydrocolloids have specifically found a wide application as additives in baked product manufacture. Xanthan gum is only the second microbial polysaccharide to be approved by FDA for use in food additives as stabilizer and thickener.

• Waste Stream Repurposing: BSFL can consume organic waste currently channeled into streams as a feedstock, which they then metabolize into high quality proteins for animal feeds.
• Food Enhancement (Composite Cassava-Wheat Flour Bread): Food grade Xanthan gum can be included in Composite Cassava-Wheat Flour Bread (baking recipe).
story. Presently, despite all effort and incentives by the Federal Government of Nigeria to encourage Master Bakers to use Cassava –Wheat Flour composite, utilization is below 12%.
• Cassava Bagasse Pellets Biomass boiler will be used to generate steam for the drying process within the factory which will lower energy cost.
• There will be minimal water loss and optimization of the 7500 Liters of water consumption per hour for a 20 ton per day capacity starch factory as more water will be treated, reused and recycled within the starch production facility, thereby enhancing sustainability.

There is a nexus between ecology and prosperity. By converting waste to wealth and substantial value addition in the Nigerian cassava starch industry, profitability and sustainability will be improved. This project utilizes the potentials of BSF (Hermetia illucens) and Xanthomanas campestri as
bioreactor for the conversion of Cassava Bagasse to protein biomass for animal feeds and food grade/none-food grade xanthan gum.

In the industrial production is used 2–4% of carbon source as sucrose or glucose, and 0.05–0.1% of nitrogen source as yeast extract, peptone, ammonium nitrate or urea. The cost, rheological properties and yield of this gum depends on the culture medium used in the fermentation process.

Besides other food values, Cassava Bagasse contains carbohydrate as its main nutritional composition, requiring amylase enzymes for their breakdown. Although BSF larvae uses a cocktail of enzymes to digest different substrates, amylase is the most dominant. The high titre of these enzymes in BSF larvae have fore-played the breakdown of polysaccharides in the Cassava Bagasse into soluble monosaccharides, hence their quick uptake alongside other nutritional requirements, allowing for fastest growth. 

• Waste Stream Repurposing: BSFL can consume organic waste currently channeled into streams as a feedstock, which they then metabolize into high quality proteins for animal feeds.
• Food Enhancement (Composite Cassava-Wheat Flour Bread): Food grade Xanthan gum can be included in Composite Cassava-Wheat Flour Bread (baking recipe).

 Presently, despite all effort and incentives by the Federal Government of Nigeria to encourage Master Bakers to use Cassava –Wheat Flour composite, utilization is below 12%. Hydrocolloids have specifically found a wide application as additives in baked product manufacture. However, a maximum of 1% xanthan gum was found sufficient to retard moisture loss and firming of the bread crumb

Employment opportunity.

Cassava (Maniot esculenta)- a woody shrub cultivated for its edible, starchy, tuberous root — is a major staple in Nigeria, the world’s largest producer of the crop. Nigeria presently has 15 functioning Cassava Starch factories with combined annual production-capacity of 45,000 MTPA. The crop is drought tolerant and rich in carbohydrate, it is also a lifeline to the country’s 30 million smallholder farmers. But the root’s exceptionally short-shelf-life means that more than 40% of its yield is lost before it is processed and the effluent discharge (Cassava-Bagasse) of about 250,000MTPA is channeled to the environment and streams within the host-communities.

https://www.biostream-international.com/

Biostream has the capacity to manufacturer a large range of fermenters and bioreactors. The company has evolved the last years from service & maintenance and customization on existing bioreactors to supplying a complete range of standard reactors. The vision is to provide a total solution for our customers with the support of our experienced fermentation researchers.

Starting from 50 ml small scale reactors

Up to bioreactor vessels of 15³ including auxiliary vessels, UHT, CIP and filtration

1.

Sujithra B., Deepika S., Akshaya K., Ponnusami V., 2019. Production and optimization of xanthan
gum from three-step sequential enzyme treated cassava bagasse hydrolysate. Journal of
Biocatalysis and Agricultural Biotechnology 21 (2019) 101294

DOI:10.1016/j.bcab.2019.101294

2.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319402351_Black_Soldier_Fly_Biowaste_Processing_-_A_Step-by-Step_Guide

• August 2017

• Edition: 1st
• Publisher: Eawag - Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology
• ISBN: 978-3-906484-66-2

• Project: BSF Research at Eawag

• Bram Dortmans

• Stefan Diener

• Bart Verstappen

• Christian Zurbrügg

Employment: 1000 women

To ensure profitability and sustainable production of xanthan gum from Black Soldier fly larvae and Xanthomonas campestri

Financial, technical, legal, cultural, or market barriers that may limit our impact in the next year and the next five years include:

Financial: Cost of scaling up and competing favourably with the big players is huge. 

Market Barriers:

Wheat-Cassava Flour composite needs a maximum of 1% xanthan gum is sufficient to retard moisture loss and firming of the bread crumb. On a national scale, master bakers (Bread alone) may need a minimum of 30,000 tons per annum.

Partnership Potential:

Local Flour mills can partner to work on volume production

full-time staff:10

part-time staff: 20

contractors or other workers: 40

Total: 70

The Team Lead:

Damilare is a thorough bred professional in the Nigerian Cassava Starch Industry, his expertise ranges from installation, equipment sourcing/adaptability to Nigerian terrain and optimization of profitable production processes without compromising Quality. He has 7 years working experience and has worked in the Upstream and Downstream sectors of the industry where he played active roles in increasing Production related profit margin for Psaltry International Company by 20% within two years (2016-2018) and improving the competitiveness of Cassava Starch against imported Corn Starch. He had a stint at the Nigerian Breweries, Ibadan where he worked with foreign expatriates using cassava starch as raw material and improving the saccharification time from 14 hours to 6 hours for the production of Maltose Syrup by Enzyme-Enzyme Hydrolysis. He is also a Team Lead/Member representing Psaltry in the Nestle Supplier Development Training and Unilever Responsible Sourcing/Technical Partnership on Product Development (Cassava Flour and Sorbitol) in order to meet Customer Specifications.

Other Members of the Team:

We have women scientists, teachers, artists, engineers and farmers as part of our team making up a multidisciplinary Team with diverse perspectives and background. The experience shared by our team members help us to converge our solution for the use of humanity.

www.biostream-international.com

Partnership on the design and installation of lab scale and commercial scale Bioreactor.

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Sustainability

Environment

Food security

Poverty Alleviation

According to the United Nations Refugee Agency, UNHCR, Over 3.3 million people have been displaced, including over 2.5 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in north-eastern Nigeria, over 550,000 IDPs in Cameroon, Chad and Niger and 240,000 refugees in the four countries.

The Boko Haram insurgency has displaced nearly 2.4 million people in the Lake Chad Basin.

https://www.unhcr.org/nigeria-emergency.html

Although the Nigerian military has regained control in parts of the country’s north-east, civilians in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger continue to be affected by grave violations of human rights, widespread sexual and gender-based violence, forced recruitment and suicide bombings.

In 2019, the Nigerian refugee crisis will be going into its sixth year. Since violent attacks of the Islamist group Boko Haram started to spill over Nigeria’s north-eastern frontier in 2014, Cameroon, Chad and Niger have been drawn into what has become a devastating regional conflict.

To date, the Lake Chad Basin region is grappling with a complex humanitarian emergency. Over 3.3 million people have been displaced, including over 2.5 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) in north-eastern Nigeria, over 550,000 IDPs in Cameroon, Chad and Niger and 240,000 refugees in the four countries. Women and children are the most affected.

The crisis has been exacerbated by conflict-induced food insecurity and severe malnutrition, which have risen to critical levels in all four countries. Despite the efforts of Governments and humanitarian aid in 2019, some 3.5 million people remain food insecure in the Lake Chad Basin region and will depend on assistance.

We hope to become partner in progress with UNHCR’s work which also includes efforts to ensure that the rights of persons of concern are respected. This work is among other things, geared towards preventing and responding to Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV) through the provision of legal and psycho-social support to survivors of SGBV. Such efforts also encompass the provision of shelter and basic household items as well as safeguarding legal rights by providing documentation and legal aid.