Vol. 12, Issue 6 (2023)

Rice is a foremost vital staple crop for over half of world’s population providing 21.0% of global human per capita energy and 15.0% of per capita protein. The majority of developing nations rely heavily on rice as a basic food. The United Nations recognized the importance of this crop and the declared 2004 as ‘International year of Rice’.

Germination is a simple and economic method for improving grain quality and was gaining increased interest due to health benefits of germinated grains. It was inexpensive and effective method for improving the overall nutritional quality of food grains by enhancing their digestibility and total sugars as well as decrease the dry weight and starch content.

In the present study, the physico-chemical and nutritional analysis of the germinated Siddi rice were compared with ungerminated ones. The findings of colour estimation revealed higher L*, b*, E* and lower a* values for germinated Siddi rice resulting lighter and less red coloured grains This signified that germination can profoundly affect the physical parameters of rice grains.

The water activity of raw Siddi rice was 0.65±0.01 and germinated rice was 0.62±0.02. The raw and germinated rice showed moisture content of 12.53±0.18 and 11.57±0.15 ash of 0.78±0.01 and 1.16±0.01, protein of 10.56±0.11 and 11.65±0.14, fat of 1.25±0.09 and 1.10±0.01, crude fiber of 0.32±0.01 and 0.37±0.02, carbohydrates of 73.20±0.33 and 75.61±0.16 g with energy content of 355.70±0.50 and 349.70±0.40 Kcal for 100 g of the samples respectively.

The total sugars, non-reducing sugars contents of germinated rice were higher compared to raw rice by 29.42 and 32.54% respectively whereas reducing sugar, total starch, amylose and amylopectin contents decreased for germinated by 17.50, 11.17, 15.24 and 8.90% respectively.