Breeding cassava to meet consumer preferences for product quality

Understanding cassava varietal preferences through pairwise ranking of gari‐eba and fufu prepared by local farmer–processors

“…The comparison between the best and worst varieties shows that champion processors in both Osun and Imo preferred varieties that have a lower redness (a* value) while brightness (L*value) is not different between the best and the worst varieties. These findings contrast with the observation by Abass et al (2017) that often the brightness is more important than the colour. Given the large emphasis for a bright non-brown colour by farmer-processors, this preference suggests that they look for gari with lower a* values.…”

“…From a food science perspective, a good quality root for gari should be harvested at maturity (ranging from about 8 to 18 months after planting, depending on the variety) and have high dry matter content. The higher the moisture content of cassava roots, the lower the gari yield, the longer the roasting time and the lower the gari final quality (Abass et al ., 2017). However, processors are known to be able to adjust procedures to attain high quality of gari despite differences in root dry matter (Ezeocha et al ., 2019; Dahdouh et al ., 2020).…”

“…Concerning texture, gari with a smooth homogeneous texture is preferred. Gari must be crispy and should not contain sand particles, black specks or residual peels (Abass et al ., 2017).…”

“…These findings contrast with the observation by Abass et al . (2017) that often the brightness is more important than the colour. Given the large emphasis for a bright non‐brown colour by farmer–processors, this preference suggests that they look for gari with lower a * values.…”