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DETERMINATION OF THE MICROBIAL LOAD ON SPOILT EGUSI

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Egusi, also known as melon seeds, is a popular ingredient in many African dishes. It is commonly used to make soups and stews, providing both nutritional and culinary value. However, like many agricultural products, egusi is susceptible to spoilage due to microbial contamination. Spoilt egusi not only loses its nutritional value but can also pose serious health risks to consumers. Understanding the microbial load on spoilt egusi is crucial for developing effective preservation methods and ensuring food safety.

Fruit juices are very nutritive, invigorating and non-alcoholic beverage, which is very well liked throughout the world. Juice may be squeezed directly from fruits or may be extracted by water. These juices can be used in their natural concentrations or in processed form. They are very scrumptious and palatable and they have most of the minerals necessary for growth and development, like calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, and sodium and vitamins especially vitamin C (Food and Drug Administration (FDA), 1999). However, these processed juices contain mainly water, sugar, preservatives, colour, fruits pulps and other additives as ingredients and must maintain sanitary standard (Doyle et al., 2001). The most commonly used preservatives are benzoic acid, sorbic acid, or sulphur dioxide (Nahar et al., 2006). Natural colours such as anthocynins and betanin are used (Wareing and Dvenport, 2005). Acid is an essential universal constitution of fruit drinks (Renard, 2008). The most commonly used acid is citric acid.

Fruit juices contain a microflora which is normally present on the surface of fruits during harvest and postharvest processing which include transport, storage, and processing (Tournas et al., 2006). Many microorganisms such as acid tolerant bacteria and fungi (moulds, yeasts) use them as a substrate for their growth. Yeasts form the main flora of fruits before processing because of acidic pH. The major genera include Candida, Dekkera, Hanseniaspora, Pichia, Saccharomyces, and Zygosaccharomyces. Penicillium, Byssochlamys, Aspergillus, Paecilomyces, Mucor, Cladosporium, Fusarium, Botrytis, Talaromyces, and Neosartorya are filamentous fungi most frequently isolated from fresh fruits and juices. Among bacteria, lactic acid bacteria and acetic acid bacteria have been isolated from fruit juices (International Commission on Microbiological Specification for Food (ICMSF), 2005).

Most fruit juices contain sufficient nutrients that could support microbial growth. Several factors encourage, prevent, or limit the growth of microorganisms in juices; the most important are pH, hygienic practice and

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