TURKEY'S NATIONAL FOOD COMPOSITION DATABASE
ESTABLISHED WITH TÜBİTAK KAMAG 1007 PROJECT SUPPORT
The 'Determination of National Food Composition and Establishment of a Widespread Continuous Sharing System' project supported within the scope of TÜBİTAK KAMAG 1007 under the leadership of TÜBİTAK MAM Food Institute was successfully completed and the national food composition database TürKomp was established. Prepared in accordance with international standards, TürKomp contains approximately 63000 data for 100 components of more than 500 foods.
The unique and sustainable national system, which includes the production, use and management of traceable data from start to finish, where the nutrient composition of unprocessed and processed agricultural products and industrialized traditional foods produced and consumed in Turkey are determined by advanced laboratory analysis techniques, will serve through the server of TürKomp, Republic of Turkey Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock, TAGEM.
Today, countries need reliable and traceable national data representing the foods produced and consumed in their geographies. However, research to establish such a data production system can only be carried out as a result of long-term and continuous projects that require high costs, technical know-how, advanced laboratory infrastructure facilities and extensive collaborations. In our country, this requirement has been tried to be met by using food ingredient data sources of various foreign countries for many years. With this project, which was realized within the scope of TÜBİTAK KAMAG 1007 project support, a food component data generation system representing Turkey was established to be used directly in all studies in the field of agriculture, food, nutrition, diet and health.
The traceable data production system in TürKomp, which is available in very few of the existing international food composition databases, is carried out electronically, and data management is ensured by standardizing data production starting with sample assignments with "TürKomp quality criteria". TürKomp includes 13 food groups according to international standards. In the system where the number of unprocessed and processed foods is almost equal, industrialized traditional foods are also included. In the research, in which a separate sampling protocol was prepared for each product, unprocessed food sampling was conducted from all over Turkey for 2 years and processed food sampling was conducted once from 3 major provinces.
The traditional food sample consisted of on-site recording of 122 different production techniques for 53 products, ingredient analysis and draft registration files prepared to prove that these products are traditional foods of Turkey. However, unfortunately, the ingredient data of traditional foods cannot be shared due to the fact that the draft law on traditional foods has not yet been enacted into law, and in order not to jeopardize the national registration process. Following the expected enactment of the bill, the TPI will be contacted immediately and the data will be available on TürKomp.
In TürKomp, where data is also displayed by region, searches can be made by "food", "ingredient", "nutrition", two different foods can be compared in terms of their components on the same screen, foods can be sorted from most to least according to their components, and daily energy and nutrient levels can be easily calculated with the "lunchbox". TürKomp, the most reliable food ingredient data source in Turkey, will provide uninterrupted service to national and international users free of charge in Turkish and English languages on the internet with its user-friendly structure. The sustainability of TürKomp and its continued development and service will be realized through commercialization. In this context, "sector brand membership" and "data set sales" will be realized for companies. In addition, for all users; "TürKomp, Food Composition Data Book", "TürKomp, Food Composition Data CD" and "TürKomp, Food Composition Analysis Methods" book prepared within the framework of contributing to the unity of food analysis methods at national level will also be offered for sale.
The objectives of TürKomp are to serve as a national data source in the fields of agriculture, food, nutrition, health; education, research, production, investment, product standardization, legislation, product development, menu planning, preparation of nutrition programs to be applied in special cases and conscious nutrition of the society;
- Contributing to improving the quality of life of the society/consumer due to nutrition,
- Eliminate external dependency in the use of food ingredient data,
- Contributing to method uniformity at national level in food ingredient data production,
- Strengthening the analysis systems of institutions/organizations producing food ingredient data,
- Contributing to the formulation of national plans and policies on agriculture, food and nutrition,
- Increasing the international market share of local brands through company membership and contributing to the sustainability of the system,
- Contributing to the national identity and economy of our traditional foods through the registration of traditional foods.
- It contributes to preventing duplication of research and identifying new research areas and investments.
