Enhancing nutritional value of banana peels as animal feed pellet using subcritical water technology

Abstract

Banana peels serve as a valuable fiber source with considerable potential for formulation of animal feed. Although it has high fibre content, lignocellulosic fibres caused low digestibility for ruminants and susceptibility of banana peels to spoilage imposes limitations on their utilization. This study highlights the use of subcritical water technology as a pretreatment to enhance nutritional value of banana peels and prolong their shelf life as ingredients in ruminant feed pellet. The proximate analysis of treated banana peels (SCW-BP) contains 6.9 ± 0.07% of crude fat, 47.3 ± 0.06% of crude fibre and 10.6 ± 0.07% crude protein. In order to produce balanced nutritional diet for ruminant feed, 54% of SCW-BP was mixed with 46% of sorghum to attain 15% of crude protein by using Pearson square method. Thus, the formulated feed ingredients produced meets the nutrient required by the ruminants.