Owing to its widely diverse chemical composition, the plant makes an ideal health food for humans. It has initiated a new trend in the field of food industry in its capacity of a raw material for making curative-prophylactic products with novel multifunctional properties.
Prepared from the tubers, it is a high quality animal feed with 250 – 300 fodder units per ton. Topinambur tubers contain easy to assimilate protein that is 1.5 times higher than that in potatoes, and at least 1.7 to 2.5 times higher than in fodder beet. Pigs fed on topinambur tubers increase their weight gain by 20-30 %, and it also improves the quality of the meat and lard obtained from them.
The high quality silage prepared from the overground parts of the plant is notable for its 230 fodder units per ton. In comparison, one ton of maize silage contains 150 fodder units; one ton of perennial grasses contains a maximum of 120 fodder units. Ensilaged topinambur is by far richer in proteins, carotene, inulin, sugars and amino acids than any other crops. The fat content of milk from cows fed on topinambur silage is always sure to be 4 % higher. Furthermore, when tubers are included in the daily ration, within five or six days the milk yields increase by 4-5 liter per day. As a high calorie food, the ensilaged green mass of HELIANTHUS TUBEROSUS is good for all kinds of animals.
A valuable renewable energy source for production of bioethanol and biogas.
Efficient recultivation of uncultivated barren, areas as well as of unproductive polluted or contaminated land (by virtue of its strategic ability to degrade heavy metals and transform them in useful compounds).
Creates a new trend of pharmaceutical products based on inulin – a main fructan of topinambur.
A valuable raw material for ethanol and fructose manufacture.
Creates new potentialities in the fields of cosmetics, phytotherapy (medicinal tea, infusions for curative baths, etc.).
Supplementary raw material for manufacturing high quality cellulose.
