Indian Mustard Varieties With Improved Oil And Seed Meal Quality

Other oils like corn oil, cottonseed oil, palm oil, palmolein oil, safflower oil, soybean oil and sunflower oil contain less than 50% of MUFA

Mustard oil has very low amount of saturated fatty acids while palm oil, palmolein and coconut oil contain very high amount of saturated fatty acids (more than 50%). Even groundnut and cottonseed oil contain more than 20% saturated fatty acids. In other oils also it is around 10% or more, thus mustard oil remains superior to others. Excessive intake of saturated fatty acid causes narrowing of arteries, which leads to coronary heart disease so in this regard rapeseed mustard oil is regarded as safer to other oils. Mustard oil contains 70% of mono unsaturated fatty acid (MUFA) while olive oil and groundnut oil contain about 70% and 50%, respectively. Other oils like corn oil, cottonseed oil, palm oil, palmolein oil, safflower oil, soybean oil and sunflower oil contain less than 50% of MUFA. However, coconut oil contains only 7.8% of MUFA. Mustard oil contains 15.2% of poly unsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) while safflower oil, corn oil, soybean oil and sunflower oil contain more than 50% of PUFA. Other oils like olive oil, palm oil and coconut oil contain less than 10% of PUFA. The benefits of mustard oil can be associated with specific fatty acids (mainly higher content of MUFA and desirable concentration of linoleic and linolenic acid) and possible also with other components, in the oil rather than with MUFA only. In the PUFA group the linoleic acid (n-6) and alpha linolenic acids (n – 3) are also important. A balance ratio of n-6 : n-3 is effective in reducing the risk of heart diseases and this ratio may be met through mustard oil, however, not by other vegetable oils. Erucic acid, one of the PUFA is predominant in Indian cultivars, which is more than 40% of the total fatty acids (<2 % is internationally accepted). The fatty acid profile of various edible oils prevalent in the market has been given in table 1.