Compositional and nutritional attributes of seeds from the multiple purpose treeMoringa oleifera Lamarck

Abstract

Moringa oleifera Lam is a multipurpose tree cultivated to use as a vegetable, for spice, for cooking and cosmetic oil and as a medicinal plant. Owing to the use of its seeds as food and as a clarifying agent of turbid water some nutritional and antinutritional characteristics were studied. The mature seeds contained 332.5 g crude protein, 412.0 g crude fat, 211.2 g carbohydrate and 44.3 g ash per kg dry matter. The essential amino acid profile compared with the FAO/WHO/UNU scoring pattern requirements for different age groups showed deficiency of lysine, threonine and valine. The content of methionine + cysteine (43.6 g kg−1 protein), however, was exceptionally higher and close to that of human milk, chicken egg and cow's milk. The seed extract agglutinated rabbit erythrocytes but did not show trypsin inhibitor and urease activities. Feeding rats with a diet containing the seed meal showed loss of appetite, impaired growth, lower NPU and enlargement of stomach, small intestine, caecum + colon, liver, pancreas, kidneys, heart and lungs and atrophy of thymus and spleen in comparison with rats fed on an egg-white diet. The results indicated that consumption of M oleifera raw mature seeds should be viewed with some caution until suitable processing methods are developed to abolish the yet unknown adverse factors. © 1999 Society of Chemical Industry