On a hot afternoon at the popular Oluwa ni Sola Food Canteen at Osho­di, Lagos, Babatunde Samuel settled down at the table to rel­ish his bowl of Amala which was generously drowned in gbegiri and ewedu soup. His prefer­ence for ponmo (cow skin) rath­er than beef and assorted meat as observed on most of the ta­bles in the canteen set him apart from other customers who were equally enjoying their meals at the time. He was indeed on his own world with three well round­ed rolls of ponmo and a piece of lean meat. None of other the eaters customers who preferred to go for meat and smoked fish could claim to have enjoyed their meals than he did.
Babatunde is probably one among Nigeria’s millions of finicky eaters. Concern over health implication of excessive consumption of meat, particu­larly red meat has forced many to seek an alternative to meat, with many embracing ponmo as a substitute for meain it’s stead. Nutrition experts are of the opinion that some red meat are high in saturated fat, which is believed to raise blood cho­lesterol. High level of blood cholesterol, they say, increases the risk of heart disease.

Experts have however fault­ed the erroneous view of many who consider ponmo as a sub­stitute for meat. A food tech­nologist at the Federal Institute of Industrial Research Oshodi (FIIRO), Mrs. Funmi Oladun­moye told Sunday Sun that ponmo lacks the needed nutri­tion and should never be seen as a substitute for meat. “The nutritional value of ponmo is very low and it is best used as emulsifier (gummy substance) sort of in food product devel­opment,” she said.

Nutritionists claim ponmo delicacy lacks the nutritional benefit that could be of help to the human health. Analysis by experts on the nutritional value on a 40 gram piece of cow skin puts the calorie at 150g, total fat (4g), saturated fat ( 1g), poly saturated fat (0g), mono saturated fat (0g) trans fat (0g) cholestron (0g) sodium (0mg) potassium (0mg) and total fat (0g), dietary fibre (0g), sugar (0 %) protein (0 %) vitamin (0%) vitamin c(0%) calcium (0%) and iron(0%).

But in spite of the claim that cow skin is lacking nutrition wise, findings by Sunday Sun show that many Nigerians crave for this delicacy even much more than fish and meat which are considered to be of more nutritional value. Mrs. Rita Okeile, a housewife told Sunday Sun at Oke-Odo Mar­ket in Lagos that her family ate more of ponmo than meat. “My husband was the first to sug­gest that we cut down on our meat consumption for health reasons. Not quite long after his suggestion, I stumbled on a write-up about the negative effect of eating meat in excess especially when one is growing older. For almost three years now, we’ve eaten less of meat but more of ponmo and fish in my house,” Mrs. Okeile said.

A similar concern has re­stricted Alhaji Idowu Yusuf to the consumption of ponmo and fish for close to five years. “I was sick in September, 2010 af­ter which I was advised to cut down on my meat consump­tion. Since then I have resort­ed to eating ponmo and fish. But I must confess, I eat more of ponmo now than fish,” the 54-year-old confessed.

Curiously, the high prefer­ence for ponmo among Nigeri­ans trying to cut down on their meat consumption on health ground as findings by Sunday Sun revealed, is in sharp con­trast to the anticipated change on the menu of an average Ni­gerian following a claim that cow skin poses more serious health risk to the consumers.

Director General, Nigerian Institute of Leather Science and Technology (NILEST) Dr. Isuwa Adamu in Abuja warned against the consumption of an­imal hides and skin. While not­ing that the delicacy lacks any nutritional benefit of any sort, Adamu said the consumption of ponmo as many erroneous­ly believe it to be a substitute for meat, is dangerous for hu­man health. “In fact, it is not advisable for you to consume ponmo in the sense that some of the animals killed and used for ponmo actually have skin diseases. Some of these skin diseases are such that boiling them ordinarily, may not kill the bacteria,’’ Adamu said.

Dr. Isuwa explained that sick animals undergoing treatment are sometimes killed without allowing the chemicals with which they are treated via in­jection to complete their cycle. And according to him the ani­mal skin retain these chemical which he said are dangerous for human consumption.

“Some of the animals, be­cause of the ailments that they have gone through, are some­times treated by way of injec­tion with chemicals. People don’t allow these chemicals to complete the cycle and be removed from the body; they sometimes go ahead to kill these animals. So, if you con­sume the ponmo, the tendency is that you are consuming the chemicals directly because the skin part of the animal retains most of the harmful substanc­es.

Indeed, consumers of ponmo have more reasons for con­cern. A recent investigation by Sunday Sun at the Lagos State Abattoir situated at Oko-Oba, Agege, Lagos revealed that ponmo consumers may be con­suming more toxic substance along with their choice delica­cy.

Sunday Sun observed two different methods of removing the hair on the animal skin. The first involves the soaking of the animal skin in hot water after which a razor is used to shave off the hair. Cow skin prepared in this method comes out in creamy white colour. On the other hand, the brown variety is prepared by subjecting the animal skin to high intensity of heat in order to burn out the hide. After this process, the skin is then washed severally and then softened through a prolong boiling.

While the two varieties of ponmo may appear innocuous on..Read More

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