Assessment of the Sanitary Quality of Precooked Cereal-Based Foods Produced in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso

Small-scale cereal-based food production companies have recently been growing in Ouagadougou. The promoters of these companies do not always apply good hygiene practices (GHP) during their activities, which can lead to the production of food of unsatisfactory quality, which can threaten the health of consumers. In view of this observation, this study was initiated with the aim of assessing the sanitary quality of four pre-cooked cereal-based foods produced in Ouagadougou's city. Thus, 27 samples of these foods (rice and maize couscous, millet and sorghum dèguè) were collected and sent to the laboratory. Microbiological and physico-chemical analyses using standard methods were performed on these samples. The results obtained show that for all the samples of the four foods, the pH varies from 6.20±0.02 to 7.79±0.01 while the water content varies from 4.80±0.72% to 9.19±0.01%. The dry matter content of the samples was between 90.00±0.01% and 95.20±0.07%. The water and oil absorption capacities of the samples vary from 130.26±5.10% to 162.02±4.20% and from 90.09±0.00% to 115.05±7.03% respectively. The loads of Total Aerobic Mesophilic Flora (TAMF) and Yeasts and Molds (YM) vary, respectively, from 1.33±0.71x102 CFU/g to 1.24±0.54x104 CFU/g and from <10 CFU/g to 2.20±0.14x103 CFU/g. For most samples, total coliforms (TC) and Thermotolerant Coliforms (TTC) loads were less than 10 CFU/g. Salmonella-Shigella was absent from all samples. Referring to the standards, for all the germs studied, 100% of the rice couscous samples, 83.34% of the millet dèguè samples, 66.66% of the sorghum dèguè samples, and 77.78% of the maize couscous samples presented satisfactory microbiological quality.