Good food for babies

Yummy porridge
You might think that if you've seen one baby cereal, you've seen them all. But then you clearly don't know about recent developments in the world of infant nutrition...

During the course of their research, scientists of the Nutritional Intervention Research Unit (NIRU) identified a need for a fortified maize-based baby porridge that would be more affordable to the majority of South African mothers.

"One of the food companies we approached had recently developed a micronutrient-fortified maize meal baby porridge, so it made the work that much easier. We decided to subject the porridge to a study that looked at different levels of fortification," Dr Faber explains.

The study kicked off in The Valley of a Thousand Hills, which is a rural area in KwaZulu-Natal. The scientists first performed a baseline study on more than five hundred children aged 6-12 months - this told them what the current nutritional status of these children were. "We took blood samples and questioned the mothers about their children's food intake."

Then the babies were given the porridge to eat for six months. "One group had the porridge fortified according to the unit's specifications, another group had the porridge fortified according to the food company's suggestions, and then we also had a control group who received the unfortified porridge."

The babies took to the porridge like ducks to water. According to Dr Faber the smooth texture is especially appealing to the children. And the mothers love it because the porridge cooks in just three minutes.

Crunch time came after six months, when blood samples were again taken of

all the babies. "We found that the MRC formulation boosted the babies' iron status significantly; more so than the food company's formulation, which was fortified at a lower level compared to the MRC formulation," Dr Faber explains.

Besides the blood tests, the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) also performed cognitive tests on the children. Again the "MRC porridge" came out tops. Faber says that, as a result of the better iron status of the children in this group, they scored better in the motor development tests.

The food company has subsequently increased the fortification levels of their porridge, and it is already being commercially marketed. But the best news is the price: the cereal sells for approximately R7 per 400g, which is much cheaper than other fortified baby cereals. So it's a winner all round!