ABSTRACT

Tomato (Lycopcrsicon esculentum) is a perishable savoury red edible fruit widely cultivated and consumed worldwide either raw or processed, but mostly grind into paste and used in cooking stew and soups. The main objective of this study was to assess the quality of commercially available fresh tomatoes from markets in Umuahia. Fresh tomatoes were collected from Ubani, Orieugba and Ndoro market. The tomatoes were assessed for their proximate analysis, mineral composition, vitamin composition, physicochemical properties and microbial analysis. Proximate analysis ranged from 86.33 to 94.56%, 0.89 to 1.08%, 0.19 to 0.89%, 0.50 to 0.60%, 1.02 to 1.1.3%, 2.50 to 10.76% and 16.98 to 50.27kcal, for moisture content, protein content, fat content, ash content, crude fibre content, carbohydrate content and energy value respectively. Mineral composition ranged from 6.15 to 10.02 mg for calcium, 10.75 to 14.07 mg for Magnesium, 2.61 to 4.54 mg for Sodium, 192.34 to 220.34 mg for potassium and 0.21 to 0.58 mg for iron. The vitamin content ranged from 0.28 to 0.42 mg for vitamin A, 0.05 to 0.10 mg for vitamin Bl, 0.02 to 0.06 mg for vitamin B2, 0.05 to 0.97 mg for vitamin B3 and 21.02 to 26.93 for vitamin c. The physicochemical properties ranged from 4.01 to 5.90 % for pH value, 0.31 to 0.44 for titrable acidity and 2.98 to 3.92°brix for total soluble solids. The microbial analysis ranged from 2.35xl08 to 5.6xl08cfu/ml for bacterial count and 0.01 xlO8 to 3.89x108cfu/ml for fungal count. This study showed that fresh and nutritious tomatoes can be obtained and safely consumed from Ubani market, Orieugba market and Ndoro market. All markets where tomatoes were obtained are safe and has acceptable and healthy products.