Ukwa

How each use is prepared

Parts used: seed, sap.

• Sap as medicine

  Traditional use

  Other · sap

  People use it this way, but it has not been tested.

  Stated only in one botanical source (Useful Tropical Plants), with no condition named and no study cited. The same source says the sap of male trees is caustic and toxic. The two statements are not reconciled in the source, so the sap should be treated as having unknown use and unknown safety. ^[1]

• Seeds eaten as food

  Traditional use

  Nutrition · seed

  How it is prepared: Seeds eaten as a snack, as recorded in a survey of Nigerian fermented foods

  People use it this way, but it has not been tested.

  This is a food use, not a medicinal one. It is recorded here because the seed is the part most commonly named in Nigeria. ^[2]

• Type 2 diabetes diet

  Traditional use

  Blood sugar · seed

  People use it this way, but it has not been tested.

  The introduction of an animal study names Nigerian practitioners who often recommend breadfruit to people with type 2 diabetes. No survey or trial of that advice is cited there. In the same study, a boiled-seed extract reduced glucose tolerance in healthy rats after two weeks and raised LDL cholesterol at the 100 mg/kg dose. The authors suggest that the seed may worsen glycaemic status in people with diabetes. The seed is not shown to help diabetes. ^[4]

• Cough, malaria, anaemia, ulcer

  Traditional use

  Other

  People use it this way, but it has not been tested.

  The Yoruba plant inventory of southwest Nigeria lists this tree for these conditions and others, including haemorrhoids, venereal diseases and Guinea worm. The table text read does not state which plant part is used, and the name Afon is Yoruba, not Igbo. No trial was found. ^[5]

About this plant

A large evergreen tree of tropical Africa, known in Nigeria for its large seeds, which are eaten as a snack. Its medicinal use is mentioned only briefly in one botanical source, and no evidence is cited for it.

How to recognise it

A large, slow-growing evergreen tree, usually 15 to 30 metres tall (sometimes up to 50 metres), with a dense, spreading crown and a fluted bole. Fruits grow from the trunk. Leaves: no leaf description was found in the sources read, so the leaves are not described here; check them against a living tree or a herbarium sheet before relying on this record. Flowers: photographed in one source but not described in the text read.

Where it grows

Usually found near streams or in swampy areas in forests, at altitudes up to 1,500 metres.

Native to

Tropical Africa, from Senegal to southern Sudan, Uganda and Kenya, south to northern Angola, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique.

Scientific details

Scientific name

Treculia africana Decne.

Family

Moraceae

Sources

Not yet reviewed Drafted with AI from the sources below. Treat with care.

1. Useful Tropical Plants: Treculia africana. Useful Tropical Plants.
2. An inventory of selected Nigerian fermented foods: enhancing the trajectory of sustainable development goals. NPJ Science of Food, 2026. PMID 42010238.
3. GBIF occurrence search: Treculia africana, country NG (record count 92). GBIF.
4. Eleazu K, Maduabuchi P, Eleazu C. Effect of ethanol extract of boiled breadfruit (Treculia Africana) seed on the oral glucose tolerance, lipid profile, and body weight of normoglycemic albino rats. Food Science & Nutrition, 2018. PMID 29983953.
5. Ajao AA, Mukaila YO, Sabiu S. Wandering through southwestern Nigeria: An inventory of Yoruba useful angiosperm plants. Heliyon, 2022. PMID 35024488.