Poongodi Vijayakumar

Value Addition to Minor Millets: Kodo and Barnyard Millet Poongodi Vijayakumar

The nutritious cereals or millets are represented by sorghum, pearl millet, finger millet, maize and minor millets like barnyard millet, proso millet, kodo millet and foxtail millet. Millets are major food sources in arid and semi-arid regions of the world, and feature in the traditional cuisine of many others. Tropical countries like India have a tremendous capacity to produce minor millets. These coarse cereals can provide viable alternatives to diversify sources of health components in foods. Unfortunately this wealth of resources has proven to be double-edged sword. No strong tradition of value added research and development on minor millets is established. The future development and consumption of these nutritionally balanced delicious traditional foods will depend upon the industry's raising productivity, economy, safety and nutritional quality that can be achieved through the application of appropriate science-based technologies to their preparation on economically viable scale, better packaging, longer shelf-life and attractive marketing process.