When President Yoweri Museveni started the Presidential Initiative on Banana Industrial Development (PIBID) in 2005, no one seemed to foresee that new products would soon hit the market in the form of flour.
But 17 years down the road, Uganda is realizing the presidential dream of turning banana into various products, especially flour and exporting them to different parts of the world.
Researchers say the raw banana flour is scientifically more advantageous than wheat because it has limited carbohydrates and fat levels. The raw flour is used as baking flour to make biscuits, cakes, pastry and porridge.
Important to note is the fact that President Museveni realized the importance of the PIBID and decided to pick a top nutritionist as its head. Prof Florence Muranga was hired from Makerere University to set up a sh22b project in Bushenyi, Western Uganda. At least 40% of the harvested banana was annually going to waste in Uganda and needed to be turned into useful product. That product is raw banana flour.
To Muranga, bananas are “green gold” and Uganda will earn millions of dollars from its export.
To ensure high quality, a number of universities were invited to carry out joint research before the production could start. These included Makerere, Mbarara University of Science and Technology, Barham Kabale, Kampala International University, Busitema and Ankole Western.
According to Jolly Gonahasa Kebirungi, a nutritionist and researcher who is passionate about processing banana flour, Uganda produces so much matooke that if it is not processed it goes to waste.
“We have so much matooke in Uganda whose quantities more than double during the peak season when so much is produced and a lot goes to waste due to high supply for the limited demand. This is when processing the matooke comes in handy,” Kebirungi told local media.
“This meal is energy packed and readily available. It is used to make porridge, just like the raw flour, porridge that is highly nutritious and fast to prepare because all you need is hot water,” Ms Gonahasa explains.
Kebirunga was one of the brains behind a processing factory that was set up in Western Uganda, a top banana-growing area.
Already, Uganda is supplying raw banana flour to United Arab Emirates, US, Japan and Germany as well as China and India among others. Uganda is also marketing the banana products to regional consumers. In June, a team from PIBID was part of the bigger group that went to the Democratic Republic of Congo for a business summit. While in DRC, the team showcased various banana products and gave Congolese some samples to taste. To make it stand out of the crowd, the banana products have been branded Tooke, a short form for matooke which is the local name for bananas. Tooke products contain health nutrients like potassium, calcium, soluble fiber, vitamins and serotonin, according to researchers.
By 2021, reports indicated that the country was already exporting more than two tonnes of raw flour with plans to triple the figure.
“We are officially completing the factory by June this year and we hope to expand our production to reach a wider market,” Kebirungi said then.
