Acrylamide in West African Foods; an Awareness and Consumption survey

Acrylamide is a probable carcinogen, thus a food safety hazard. Following its discovery in foods in 2002 by the Swedish National Food Administration (SNFA), research on dietary acrylamide has increased exponentially but with little focus on heat-processed carbohydrate-rich West African (WA) foods. Thus this research aimed to investigate the extent of awareness of the acrylamide and the degree of consumption of these foods by West Africans through, an online survey. There were 1103 responses, 89.5% and 10.5% from seven West African countries and the United Kingdom (UK), respectively. 98.0% of the respondents were unaware of the occurrence of acrylamide and 99.6% were unaware of its toxicity. 81.0% of all the participants consume baked and fried carbohydrate-rich WA foods weekly. Chi square test showed no significant difference between the awareness of acrylamide and its toxicity, with p-value (0.108)>0.05.