ASSESSMENT OF CYANIDE HEALTH HAZARD ASSOCIATED WITH CASSAVA PROCESSING AMONG CASSAVA PROCESSORS IN GWARAM LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, JIGAWA STATE, NIGERIA

The study assessed the cyanide health hazard associated with cassava processing among cassava processors in Gwaram LGA of Jigawa State, Nigeria. Primary data was collected with the aid of questionnaire from 145 cassava processors. Data collected were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. Specifically, the study described the socioeconomic characteristics of the respondents, assessed the level of awareness of cyanide health hazard, examined the perception of cassava processors on cyanide health hazards. Results revealed that then mean age of the respondents was 44 years, majority (80.6%) were females and married (71.1%). Also, the mean farm size was 0.5 ha, 41.4% of the respondents had secondary education with a mean household size of 7 persons. Cassava processing was their major source of income with an average of 11 years of processing experience. The result on farmer’s level of awareness on health hazard associated with cassava processing indicated a high mean value (x=2.46) for respondent’s awareness on cyanide in cassava can completely lead to death with an overall categorization showing high awareness (91%). Results on respondent’s perception on the health hazard of cyanide revealed that fresh bitter cassava contains about 400mg/kg of cyanide with an overall perception as high as (89%). The result further revealed that about 80% of the respondents are not aware of any safe cassava processing practice with about 87% indicated that proper smoking as an effective way of mitigating the effect. Lack of training was ranked the highest (98.6%) as major constraint. The study concluded that there was high awareness and perception on cyanide health hazard with low adoption of practices to mitigate it. The study recommends that more training should be conducted and modern processing facilities to be provided to reduce the effect of cyanide