Volume 1

First report / Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire.

  • Great Britain. Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire.
Date:
1939
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: First report / Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    207/382 (page 199)
    atmosphere of carbon dioxide. Storage without the husk has great ad- vantages in bulk storage or where the article has to be transported, since the removal of the husk results in a considerable reduction in both weight and volume. Incidentally, the rice bran will be, nutritionally, a far more valuable product if it is used immediately after removal from the grain. (iii) Washing of rice before cooking may drastically reduce the beri beri- preventing factor; this is true for rice of all grades of milling. The need for washing can be eliminated :— (a) if polishing powders are abolished—they appear to serve no useful purpose, and must be washed off as they may be definitely harmful if eaten; (b) if the storage is so good that the grain does not develop an un- desirable flavour—storage of de-husked grain in hermetically sealed con- tainers meets this requirement;. (c) if milling is carried out shortly before the rice is required for consumption—milling is itself a cleansing process, and if the product is subsequently handled hygienically, further cleaning would be superfluous. (iv) Cooking must be carried out in a manner in which there is retention of vitamin Br. (v) Parboiling affords a partial solution of the problem of conservation of sufficient vitamin Br to prevent the occurrence of beriberi. It may not be acceptable, however, if there are definite prejudices against the flavour of parboiled rice. In the process there are steps in which losses of the vitamin may occur; these can be reduced by modifications based on the knowledge that vitamin Bx is soluble in water, and is more stable in slightly acid than in alkaline solutions. No advantage is gained by substituting parboiled for other rices if it is washed before cooking, as the vitamin Br is then reduced to levels at which beriberi develops. (vi) The yield of rice attained in Far Eastern countries contrasts markedly with that in many Colonial Territories. This is a matter for Agricultural Departments to take up; it involves mainly the provision of irrigation works, the control of seed selection, weeds, and harvesting and the main- tenance of soil fertility. (vii) Large tracts of undeveloped land are to be seen in some Colonial Territories which, under proper irrigation, should provide suitable ground for rice cultivation. (viii) Whilst there are differences in variety and cultural conditions which, to some extent, modify the nutritional value of rice, increased yield per unit area should be the first consideration. When conditions permit of optimal production, there is no food crop of comparable nutritional value which can approach rice in the amount of food produced on a given area. Moreover, it has a valuable sociological feature; it anchors a com- munity to the place in which it has expended capital in the form of irrigation works, including terraces, conduits, bunds, pumping and other devices for water conservation and control.