The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has given the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in Creve Coeur $8.3 million to increase the nutritional value of a staple crop in Africa.
Nearly a quarter-billion people living in sub-Saharan Africa consume cassava, or manioc. The plant science center says those who depend on the root for food often suffer from chronic malnutrition because it contains limited vitamin A or iron. The grant will fund research into increasing the level of those nutrients in cassava as well as ways to make it more accessible and affordable.
