The sesame seed story from field to burger buns

17 May 2017

Most of us have no idea how the food on our supermarket shelves gets there or what any of the ingredients look like in their most basic natural state.

The sesame seed is something we come across in numerous places, on the top of burger buns, bagels and breadsticks, in sesame snaps, Middle-Eastern desserts and in Thai stir fry dishes. Sesame oil also has a wide variety of cosmetic and industrial uses.

For farmers taking part in Farm Africa’s sesame marketing project in Babati in northern Tanzania, one important reason for growing sesame is that it is drought tolerant and suited to the local climate. Farmers are familiar with the seed and happy in the knowledge that there is consistent significant demand both locally and on the global market.

Before a sesame seed even gets close to a burger bun there is a huge amount of work to be done both in the growing and the processing, as these photos show: