Feasibility of nutritious and affordable staple food products based on local wholegrain crops in Sudan

Description

While Sudan has a rich wholegrain cereal and bread tradition, the consumption of white bread from imported wheat rapidly increased in the last decades, now accounting for over 20% of the diet, mainly driven by population growth, urbanization and changing consumer preferences. Besides this nutritional shift towards refined wheat, the increasing import dependency constrains the development of local cereal value chains and economic activities. Stimulating the processing of locally produced climate resilient crops into nutritious wholegrain staple food products can be an incentive for local economic activities, provide living income and increase food & nutrition security.
The main objective of this study was to test the feasibility of local crops to produce Sudanese staple foods. Desk research and qualitative interviews were taken with various actors: private sector, experts and other stakeholders. The second aim was to demonstrate the potential of selected wholegrain local crops to replace refined wheat flour in some Sudanese bread type products, like baladi, kisra, ghurassa and aceeda. This was performed by an exploratory co-development activity with Sudanese private sector.
The results of this study show that nutritional and attractive Sudanese staples can be made based on local, wholegrain, climate-resilient crops. Wholegrain sorghum and millet flour can be used to replace imported wheat flour in Sudanese baladi bread, when using psyllium as a functional ingredient. Whole cowpea flour (and other pulses) can be included for further nutritional improvement, increasing the protein content, specifically lysine, as well as important micronutrients.
The economic feasibility is positive, since the local crop mix is lower in cost compared to local wheat flour as well as to imported wheat flour on the domestic market. However, these domestic prices are substantially higher compared to that of refined wheat flour on the international market, which will probably favour companies with access to international trade to keep importing wheat.
Besides the technical and economic feasibility, the developed products fit well in local traditions of Sudanese foods, fermentation techniques and traditional taste and flavours of Sudan. Wholegrain flours of local climate resilient crops have potential to strengthen the local food system resilience in Sudan and we currently discuss with stakeholders the possibilities for scaling this innovation in Sudan.

Period	2 Apr 2025
Event title	8th International Whole Grain Summit
Event type	Conference/symposium
Location	Detmold, GermanyShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International