Qualidade do urucum (bixa orellana l.) produzido pelos agricultores familiares do agreste paraibano.

Abstract

The seeds of annatto (Bixa orellana L.) are widely used, for various purposes, mainly as a culinary ingredient, also used by the food industries to give color to foods, by pharmaceutical industries for the manufacture of cosmetics and for medicinal purposes. Annatto (Bixa orellana L.) is cultivated throughout Brazil, but currently the largest cultivation is found in the Southeast and North regions, many farmers use the commercialization of the seed as a means of family support, and still face many difficulties due to variation in the quality of the product that causes the devaluation in the sale price. According to research, the annatto (Bixa orellana L.) has great antioxidant potential, being possible to find in its seeds bixin and tocotrienois, compounds of greater interest for industries, because the higher the content of these compounds the greater the added value for commercialization. Therefore, this research aims to analyze annatto seeds in two localities of Agreste Paraibano, the city of Alagoinha and Settlement Senhor do Bonfim municipality of Alagoinha. The physicochemical composition of urucum seeds was investigated, and the lipid content (4.12 ± 0.28) and (2.69 ± 0.19), starch (7.21 ± 0.05) and (9.15 ± 0.08) and water activity (0.52 ± 0.01) and (0.63 ± 0.01), presented a significant difference, for Alagoinha city and Senhor do Bonfim settlement, respectively. Therefore, it is concluded that the seed of Alagoinha is of better quality as the antioxidant activity due to the elevated bixin content and presence of tocotrienol