Food for thought in Africa
by Rodney Magazinovic
The relationship between student and lecturer often doesn’t last past a semester or two but UniSA’s program director in pharmacy and medical science, Dr Stuart Andrews, has established a bond that has stretched beyond graduation and across the world.
Bachelor of Applied Science (Food Science and Nutrition) graduate from Botswana, Abia Sebaka, invited his former teacher to come to Botswana and help assess some of the food challenges facing his country.
Sebaka graduated from UniSA in December 2004 and since then has worked at the National Food Technology Research Centre (NFTRC) in Botswana.
Following his visit to Botswana, a 2700km road trip around the country last June, Dr Andrews believes that, with the right effort and continuing education, the food processing industry can develop to offer better food security to the country.
“The Batswana are highly dependent on neighbouring South Africa for much of their staple foods,” he said.
“The burgeoning diamond industry is hungry for workers and pays them much higher wages than what they could earn on the land, so more and more people have left farming, and the agriculture and food industries have suffered a bit of a collapse.
“The one shining example of excellence is Botswana’s meat corporation, which is internationally recognised and accredited as a source of good quality beef. The challenge today is to develop other food related industries to similar standards, especially to develop nutrient enriched sorghum or maize products to enhance the immune systems of sufferers of AIDS as well as infants after weaning.”
To foster this, Dr Andrews said a Citizen Entrepreneurial Development Agency had been set up to develop government sponsored projects.
“By providing grants and infrastructure they are encouraging people back into food production and processing. The goal is self sufficiency,” he said. “An important part of this is education and it was one such program which helped fund Sebaka’s studies at UniSA with the expectation that he would return to the NFTRC to undertake research.”
The NFTRC employs about 50 people. The facilities are world-class and include cutting edge pilot plants and analytical equipment. During his visit Dr Andrews worked with many of the young researchers including Sebaka to help them focus their research and to develop strategies to better use their natural raw materials, which include some fascinating indigenous foods including the marula fruit and the mopane worms.
While in Botswana Dr Andrews ran an international standards training course to provide NFTRC employees and invited food microbiologists from government organisations with the latest information on how to operate their laboratories to world’s best practice.
“I’m hopeful that collaborative research and further exchanges will be possible in the future,” Dr Andrews said. “Bringing people to Australia and training them at UniSA, then seeing them apply their knowledge and skills to enhance the quality and safety of the food supply in their home country is a very rewarding aspect of my role as a program director.”