More nutritious maize boosts growth of
children in rural Ethiopia

The heights and weights of preschool children whose diets included quality protein maize (QPM) as their main starchy staple increased more than 20% faster than those of children who ate conventional maize, according to a recent study in rural Ethiopia on the nutritional benefits of QPM and its acceptance as a food.

Maize is becoming a major staple food in Ethiopia as the price of tef—the traditional indigenous cereal—is rising beyond the means of resource-poor consumers, and its yields generally fall short of household needs. Rural communities rely more and more on maize for both calories and protein, especially where people lack access to other protein sources. CIMMYT and the Ethiopian Institute for Agricultural Research (EIAR) have introduced and adapted a maize type (quality protein maize, or QPM) with increased levels of two amino acids—lysine and tryptophan—that make more of maize’s protein useful to humans and farm animals. The QPM variety BHQP 542, released in 2002, is gaining popularity among farmers and households in environments where it is well-adapted.

Scientifically rigorous proof at the community level
Child malnutrition is rampant in Ethiopia: nearly half the children under five years of age have stunted growth, according to 2008 data from UNICEF. QPM offers more protein for resource-poor people whose diets are high in carbohydrates and low in protein. It has 90% the nutritive value of milk, and can stem or reverse protein malnutrition.

Prior studies in India, Guatemala, Brazil, Ghana, Nicaragua, and Mexico have given positive results regarding QPM’s nutrition-enhancing potential, but each of these studies had technical or other weaknesses. The current study was conducted by the Ethiopian Health & Nutrition Research Institute (EHNRI), Sasakawa-Global 2000 (SG-2000), and CIMMYT, using grants from the “Quality Protein Maize Development for the Horn and East Africa” (QPMD) project funded by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). The researchers provided farmers in selected maize-growing and consuming communities in western Ethiopia with seed of either the improved QPM variety, BHQP 542, or of conventional maize. They then measured over 12 months the impact of QPM or conventional maize consumption on the growth and nutritional status of children between six months and five years of age, in households where maize was the main starchy food. Participating families did not know which type of maize they were using, and received enough seed to grow a full year’s supply of maize grain. “They received the maize not as prepared food or meals, as occurred in previous studies, but as seed and fertilizer on credit, the practice to which farmers are accustomed,” says Dr. Girma Akalu, Applied Nutrition Specialist at EHNRI who led the study. The health of people in the community and other confounding factors were carefully controlled. For example, all children received treatment for gastrointestinal parasites, and anti-malarial medication was on hand to control outbreaks of that disease.

Mothers know best
In many communities, mothers prepare porridge and other weaning foods for their young children, mainly from cereal flours. As with other foods, the greater their palatability, the more children will like to eat them. Girma and his EHNRI team encouraged mothers in surveyed households to prepare and give maize foods as they normally would. After households began using the study maize, the team found that the children fed on QPM grew 21% faster in height and 26% faster in weight than those who ate only normal maize. At the end of the study, mothers also confirmed that their children preferred the taste of QPM-based foods, especially the porridge, which they said was smoother and not sour, as is sometimes the case with normal maize. The children also liked the sweet taste of QPM ears. The mothers said they would continue using QPM to prepare weaning foods because their children liked it. They also believed their children’s growth benefited from their eating QPM. “The EHNRI study was not perfect,” says CIMMYT maize agronomist Dennis Friesen, “but it was unique and useful, in that it took place in a normal community; that is, a non-clinical setting. This implies that, under similar socio-economic and dietary circumstances in other communities, one might expect similar health and nutrition benefits.”

Farmers' acceptance of QPM is promising
The beneficial qualities of recent varieties of QPM—all of which derive from 30 years of breeding work by CIMMYT—go beyond mere nutritional quality. “We like the compactness of the BHQP 542 grain; it makes it harder for the weevils to damage this maize during storage,” said farmers interviewed during the study. BHQP 542 also gives crop stands that don’t lodge and has early maturity and heavy grain. “Its early maturity helps it escape drought stress when the rainy season begins late or ends early,” says Friesen. In a good rainy season, farmers still prefer the higher yields of their popular, late-maturing variety, but even then they can grow a stand of BHQP 542 and harvest it early to avoid the “hungry season”—the months between the time when their previous season’s grain stocks run low and when the following season’s crop is ready for harvest.

Work still remains to improve QPM for Ethiopia. “To gain truly widespread adoption, we need a QPM version of the popular, late-maturing variety BH 660,” says Friesen. CIMMYT maize breeder Twumasi-Afriye and his colleagues in EIAR have just such a variety in the pipeline. “It’s undergoing tests in farmers’ fields this year,” says SG2000 country manager, Aberra Debello. “When it’s released, it will spread like wildfire.”

For more information: Dennis Friesen, CIMMYT maize agronomist and QPMD Project Coordinator (d.friesen@cgiar.org)

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