The market for functional ingredients is clearly expanding. Different reports highlight the high business figures that are beginning to move and the sustained and constant growth that is expected for the coming years. Today we will talk about functional foods and nutraceuticals.

New nutritional trends and the need to meet growing social and health demands have driven the increasingly demanded concept of functional foods and nutraceuticals that, in addition to their general nutritional functions, have certain properties for maintaining health. .

One of the main challenges facing this revolution in functional foods and nutraceuticals is the absence of a single and universal definition, as well as legal regulations for them. In addition to the strict regulation of the different "claims" (allegations, considerations or declarations) of nutritional properties, health properties and disease risk reduction.

This conceptual vacuum has generated a great confusion of terms on the part of the consumer, which has been taken advantage of in certain advertising marketing campaigns, which is why, at Innofood, dedicated to the research and development of new foods, we consider it very important to publicize the meaning of these concepts.

What is a functional food?

Within the many existing definitions, according to the International Food Information Council, it is "any food similar in physical appearance to conventional food, consumed as part of the daily diet, but capable of producing demonstrated metabolic or physiological effects, useful in the maintenance of good physical and mental health, in reducing the risk of chronic-degenerative diseases, in addition to its basic nutritional functions”. Therefore, we can consider functional foods to be those natural or processed foods that, beyond providing nutrients, have been scientifically shown to beneficially affect one or more functions of the body, in such a way that they provide a better state of health and well-being, by exerting a preventive role, reducing the risk factors that cause the appearance of diseases.

What is a nutraceutical?

A nutraceutical compound can be defined as a dietary supplement or complement, presented in a non-food matrix (pills, capsules, powder, etc.), of a concentrated bioactive natural substance, usually present in food and that, taken in a higher dose to that existing in these foods, it has a favorable effect on health greater than that which the food itself could have. In other words, nutraceuticals are food components or parts thereof that provide a proven and added benefit for health, capable of providing medical improvements, in the prevention and treatment of diseases.

Therefore, a nutraceutical differs from medicines, since these are usually synthetic products and most of them do not have a natural biological origin. And it differs from herbal extracts and infusions in the concentration of its components and in that the latter do not have to have a therapeutic action.

In a functional food there is a nutraceutical value that refers to those components that are attributed health maintenance and enhancement functions.

As we have seen, there is a wide range of meanings ("functional foods", "nutraceuticals", "foods", "design foods", etc.), which are handled indistinctly by the population in general, which, at For practical purposes, they could be considered synonyms, although they present certain specific nuances:

• A functional food always has to be a food of ordinary consumption in the current diet.
• A nutraceutical is not a food per se, but a product that contains some functional food components, more or less isolated.
• A functional food has a beneficial effect such as lowering cholesterol, but it is small and long-term (eg, a nut or milk rich in omega-3).
• A nutraceutical is the biological part of the functional food that lowers cholesterol (eg, phytosterol).
• A medicine is the result of pharmacological research and, generally, a synthetic product (eg, ezetimibe). It acts in the short term and to cure some condition.
• A functional food and a nutraceutical do not intend to cure anything, but to prevent, and only if they are framed within a healthy diet.

It is an increasingly confirmed fact that the new habits of the consumer for health occupy a central place, so that the food industry needs to renew and promote this linear in constant evolution. At Innofood, we join this trend and are committed to the design and development of all kinds of healthy foods and all their consumption possibilities, supporting the industry and providing clear and accessible food information to the final consumer.