Can blended flour recipes made of locally available and cheap ingredients be used for adequate complementary feeding of infants in rural settings in Burkina Faso?

Malnutrition, including deficiencies in micronutrients, stunting, wasting andunderweight, is a publichealthconcernamong children under-five yearsin developing countries. Inadequate complementary feeding consisting of giving monotonous, low-energy and low-micronutrientsdense cereal porridge is a common cause of malnutrition.Theobjectiveof this study wastoidentify and to assessthe nutritional quality and the energy content of infant and young child homemade blended flours in the rural settings of Southwest Burkina Faso in order to promote blended flour recipes whose composition would besuitable as complementary foods for breastfed infants and young children in Burkina Faso.Cereal-based local blended flourswere recorded through a survey in 10 villages. Five (5) recipes that contained at least one protein source(like beans or animal product)were selected for improvement and nutrient content analysis. Sensory evaluationofthe porridge made from theblendedflourswas conducted usingtheinfants, youngchildren andmothers. Thefeasibility (cost and workload involved)havebeenalsoassessed among mothers.Theenergy content ofanalyzed blended flours rangedfrom 430 to 454 kcal/100g, with 11.5 to 14g of protein. Flours were well accepted by children.The timerequired to prepare a blended flour recipe was estimated at 2 hours per weekfor one child, and all women interviewed found it acceptable.Flours recipes that used sugar were found costly and unaffordable by40 to 50% ofwomenaccording to the blended flour. Taking into account the cost, twoblendedflours recipes were preferred: Flour recipe A: Pearl millet (48%), beans (7%), peanuts(23%), sumbala(fermented seed of Parkia biglobosa) (7%), and monkey bread (15%).Flour recipe B: Pearl millet (48%), beans (7%), peanuts (26%), small fish powder (4%), and monkey bread (15%).All the five blended floursmet the minimum recommended energy density for complementary food of 400 kcal/100g.However, exceptfor vitamin C, the micronutrients contents were insufficient. To address micronutrients deficiencies in this rural setting of Burkina Faso, additional sources of micronutrients should be given to children.