Nutritional and Anti-nutritional Compositions of the Leaves and Stem Bark of Ficus glumosa

Aim: To evaluate the proximate, mineral, anti-nutritional and amino acid compositions of Ficus glumosa leaves and stem bark.

Place and Duration of Study: The proximate, mineral and anti-nutritional compositions were determined in the Chemistry Laboratory of Ekiti State University, Ado – Ekiti while the amino acid was determined at the Analytical Laboratory of Multi-Environmental Management Consultant, Lagos, Nigeria. The research was carried out between November 2020 and September 2021.

Methodology: All investigations were carried out using well established analytical procedures. Amino acid analysis was carried out through ion exchange chromatography (IEC) using the Technicon Sequential Multisample (TSM) Amino Acid Analyser.

Results: The results revealed that the leaves and the stem bark of Ficus glumosa had moisture contents of 9.78 and 9.67% respectively. Crude protein of 18.8% was recorded for the leaves while 7.73% was recorded for the stem bark. The leaves were observed to contain higher mineral contents than the stem bark. Na/K ratios were 0.048 (leaves) and 0.09 (stem bark). Out of the four anti-nutrients evaluated for the leaves and stem bark, tannins recorded the highest values of 5.42 and 12.5 (mgTAE/g) respectively. Amino acid compositions showed that the leaves and the stem bark contained a total of 95.2 and 83.4 g/100g cp amino acids respectively. Highest concentrated amino acid was Glu with 12.8g/100g cp and 16.2g/100g cp for both leaves and stem bark. Essential amino acid (with His) was 44.9g/100g cp (47.2%) for the leaves and 37.2g/100g cp (44.6%) for the stem bark.

Conclusion: The leaves and stem bark of Ficus glumosa contained appreciable amount of crude protein, important mineral elements and essential amino acids which could contribute to alleviating the problem of protein malnutrition in developing countries.