Dr. Daniel N. Sila
Affiliation: Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT)
Profession: Lecturer, Department of Food Science and Technology
Key Qualifications
Holds a PhD in Bioscience Engineering from KU Leuven, Belgium. Has over 10 years of
experience in plant based foods work, particularly fruits and vegetables at research level and
industrial set up. Has over 25 publications in international peer review journals of high
impact and has presented in many international fora. Key strengths which highlight the
major assignments pursued in the 5 years include being a project leader in VLIR-UOS funded
beans project, Aus AID funded amaranth project, Mango JKUAT project, Cactus JKUAT
project. Is currently a senior lecturer in the Department of Food Science and Technology and
the Chairman of the Department of Agricultural Resource Economics (JKUAT).
A Kenyan University Becomes a Centre of Excellence for Legume Research in East Africa
through VLIR-UOS Own Initiative Funding
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) is one of the 23 public
universities in Kenya. It was started as a middle level college in 1981 before it grew into a
fully pledged university through the JKUAT Act of 1994. It is the 5th largest public university
in Kenya seeking global excellence in Training, Research and Innovation for Development. It
was initially meant to train graduates majorly in agricultural sciences before other Faculties
were embraced: Science, Engineering, Biotechnology Research, Energy and Environment
Technology, Computer Science and Information Technology, Tropical Medicine and
Infectious Diseases, Human Resource Development, Architecture and Building Sciences
(Figure 1). The main university campus has about 15,000 registered students drawn from all
income classes and gender. The Faculty of Agriculture is well established and has four
departments: Horticulture, Food Science and Technology, Agricultural Resource Economics
and Land Resources and Animal Health. The Department of Food Science and Technology
(FST) offers training in the areas of food science and technology, nutritional sciences,
postharvest technology and food service and hospitality management to about 300
students. The training is offered at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. The
Department, therefore, aims at producing well trained graduates, provided with the
knowledge and skills, to meet the manpower requirements of the food industry, postharvest
handling systems and nutritional aspects depending on the degree program one enrolls in.
The Department is, indeed, the only one of its kind in any University in the East, Central and
Southern African regions, offering specialized training in Postharvest Science and
Technology. The Department carries out both basic and applied research, geared particularly
towards solving local problems.
Figure 1. The Main Gate of Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology
The department of Food Science and Technology at JKUAT is the home for 7 IUPFOOD VLIRUOS funded alumni students. These includes 2 KU Leuven PhD alumni from the Laboratory of
Food Technology (Dr. Daniel Sila PhD 2007 and Dr. Ann Munyaka PhD 2011), a JKUAT PhD
graduate (Dr. Michael Wawire PhD 2013) who carried part of his work at the Laboratory of
Food Technology (LFT) at KU Leuven, and Dr. Joshua Arimi who graduated with a PhD from
the University of Dublin (Ireland) but a former MSc graduate from LFT. Additionally, the
following KULeuven –UGent graduates were students at JKUAT: Juliana Kiio, Alice Ngima,
Susan Ndirangu (deceased). Other MSc graduates from the IUPFOOD program from Kenya
who trained at LFT are Silvenus Konyole (Nairobi University) and Daniel Njoroge MSc 2011
(Egerton University).
Figure 2. Prof Marc Hendrickx’s visit to Kenya (left) 2012 and (right) 2013 with his former/current
students
In 2011, FST and LFT jointly won a collaborative funding under the VLIR-UOS Own Initiative
Program. The project is a North-South collaborative research led by Prof. Marc Hendrickx
from LFT, KULeuven and Dr. Daniel N. Sila from FST, JKUAT. The project targets building
students and staff capacity at JKUAT while addressing the Food and Nutrition Insecurity
Problem in Kenya. FST has been faced with problems in teaching, research and extension
due to insufficient funds for research and inadequate teaching capacity in a number of
disciplines. The number of programmes and students is increasing while staff recruitment
and training remains constant. The main objective of this proposal was to strengthen FST
through capacity building (academic goal) while trying to mitigate food insecurity and
malnutrition problems (development goal). It is in this perspective that the hard to cook
(HTC) problem in common beans was identified as entry point due to the high prevalence of
the problem in the humidity, high temperature climatic conditions of Kenya (Figure 3). It is
anticipated that scientific measures of reducing the hard to cook prevalence will be
developed while creating a variety of cheap and highly nutritious bean based cuisines and
formulae acceptable within the local communities. To highlight the major activities of the
project, capacity building, research out puts and dissemination pathways will be discussed.
Figure 3. Daniel Njoroge sampling various bean varieties found in Kenyan markets
Capacity building at FST
At the beginning of the project implementation, 2 PhD students were engaged in 2011
namely Mr. Daniel Njoroge (a MSc graduate of KULeuven) and Mr. Peter Kahenya (a JKUAT
graduate). The students follow a sandwich program that allows them to spend two third of
their time at the home university while travelling to Belgium to carry out the experiments
that they cannot do at home due to equipment limitations. In order to fully understand what
causes the hard to cook problem, Daniel Njoroge is trying to understand the mechanisms
responsible for the hard to cook defect while Peter Kahenya looks at integrated food
solutions for reversing the hard to cook defect and its impact on the nutritional properties of
common beans and bean based recipes. By the end of 2014, 3 MSc students will have
benefited from the project. Through the VLIR- UOS funding, a number of state of the art
equipments have been bought at FST to strengthen the current infrastructural capacity
(Figure 4). This includes an automated HPLC unit equipped with a diode array and refractive
index detectors for fingerprinting a diverse range of the nutrient and antinutrient
compounds, a UV-Vis spectrophotometer and a texture analyzer.
Figure 4. Investment in equipment through VLIR-UOS funding indicating (left) a HPLC system, and
(right) A desktop Computer and Color Printer
Scientific Milestones of the project
A number of interesting results have been obtained midway in the project. First and most
importantly, local bean varieties have been classified into hard to cook and easy to cook.
Additionally, pectin related changes and the rate of moisture uptake have been identified as
important mechanisms with regard to the HTC problem. Preliminary results indicate that the
cooking time of beans can be reduced by 50% using low cost food processing technologies.
Inclusion of beans in common starchy staple diets has been demonstrated as one of the best
ways of averting the malnutrition problem while creating income by increasing the number
of acceptable food products in common super markets.
Outreach and dissemination of information
In order to increase the adoption rate of the project outputs, a participatory approach is
being employed where stakeholders within the different segments of the bean value chain
are engaged. This was the genesis for the formation of a stakeholder platform which meets
on a yearly basis to review project progress and to give corrective action. It is in this platform
where the adoption process is catalyzed through engagement of the private and public
sector players. The students have produced a number of bakery products using the pilot
plant facilities at JKUAT (Figure 5) and show cased them in national and international
exhibitions (Figure 6).
Figure 5: Some of the products developed and exhibited in the shows (scones, cakes and cookies).
They contain 50% cooked beans on wet basis (Red haricot variety).
Figure 6: Participation in National Exhibitions: (left) Nairobi International Trade Fair and (right) Nyeri
Show in 2013
It is anticipated that FST will strategically be transformed in to a center of excellence in
legume research by the end of the Project. Thanks to the support from VLIR-UOS and the
entire LFT team through the able leadership of Prof. Marc Hendrickx.
Contact information
Dr. Daniel N. Sila
Lecturer
Department of Food Science and Technology
Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT)
Email: danielsila@agr.jkuat.ac.ke
Website: http://www.jkuat.ac.ke/departments/foodscience/