Nutritive compounds from leaves of Moringa oleifera L. and beans of Vigna unguiculata W. for improvement of the meal deriving with new shoots of Borassus aethiopum M. in Côte d'Ivoire.

Borassus aethiopum Mart, known as Palmyra, is a wild palm tree [1] within the plant family of Arecaceae. It is met in the tropical areas of Asia and Africa, especially in the sub-Saharan environment. In Côte d'Ivoire, Palmyra is mainly located in the central region where it represents a sentry against the wilderness projection. This palm tree is one of the unwoody forest products and can reach 20 to 30 m of height [2]. It allows uses in technology [3], traditional medicine [4, 5] and is recommended in the reafforestation to curb the wilderness projection [6]. It is also used in food [7, 8]. Thus, in Côte d'Ivoire, several farmers utilize the Palmyra at the adult stage for production of palm wine, a fermented drink resulting from its sap [9]. However, this production usually involves destruction of the plant phloem or heart. Nevertheless, palm wine production is practicable from other organs such as the unopened inflorescences of the palm trees [10]; with advantage in maintaining the plant’s life. Unfortunately, the destruction of the plant heart during the palm sap production results in its earlier and systematic death [11] threatening the biodiversity. Besides, many populations use the new shoots of Palmyra, resulting from the germination of seeds, for food purposes. Facing all the ecological risks incurred, this way of valorization seems to be a real alternative in the plant’s uses, and could ensure its survival and popularization, with significant value-added at nutritional, economical and therapeutical levels. Indeed, Palmyra trees provide numerous fruits each year, the most part of which are unutilized and go rotten before germinating [11, 12]. Several research tasks have been performed concerning these fruits. Thus, from the fruit pulp, Ezoua et al. [9] produced a juice richer in soluble sugars, especially sucrose, glucose and fructose. Diby et al. [13] also obtained fruit pulp nectar which could possibly undergo alcoholic fermentation. Other researches accounted pectins resulting from the Palmyra fruits. Each fruit encloses two or three seeds generating potentially new growths after germination. 

The young Palmyra shoots are tuberous and edible foods highly valued by the local populations as energeous food resource [14]. They are often processed into flour for the preparation of porridge or local fufu [8]. The flour of Palmyra is richer in starch and can undergo alcoholic fermentation after hydrolysis with the gastric juice deriving from Archachatina ventricosa as mentioned by Niamké et al. [2]. Other attempts revealed the preventive effect provided by the consumption of young shoots of Palmyra against the gastro duodenal ulcers and the sickly fever [15, 16]. Yet, as the most of starchy foods, the young shoot tubers of Palmyra would be with lower proteins, mineral elements and vitamins contents. In this case, meals prepared on those tubers basis should be improved with other local edible vegetable sources, particularly with cowpea (Vigna unguiculata Walp) and moringa (Moringa oleifera Lam) which have ability to correct the nutritional deficiency, referring to the recommendations of the codex alimentarius [17]. The cowpea contains high quality proteins in significant contents of 23% to 25% [18, 19]. Regarding with moringa, the nutritional interest is related to the leaflets which have good minerals and vitamins properties (El Massry et al., 2013) [20]. Moreover, they contain the 8 or 9 human essential amino acids [21], accounting cowpea as an exceptional case of the plant kingdom. 

Considering their food interest, the development of composite dishes with Palmyra new shoots basis, improved with the moringa leaflets and the cowpea beans, could benefit to populations. However, it is highly vital to control the nutritive compounds of these three food raw materials before any formulation. The running study is a comparative investigation about the nutritive components of the flour deriving from new shoots tubers of Borassus aethiopum Mart, and powders of leaflets of Moringa oleifera Lam and beans of Vigna unguiculata Walp, collected from the Ivorian flora, for their fitting development.