Food as medicine: The functional ingredients promising health and wellness
Today’s consumers are not turning to food and drink for energy alone. A more nuanced understanding of the relationship between diet and health is coming to shape consumer attitudes to food.
So which ingredients offer greatest potential in health and wellness? At FoodNavigator’s upcoming digital summit Positive Nutrition 2024, we’ll ask how the latest nutritional science is informing functional food and drink trends.
13 March: Food as Medicine
11am CET Fireside chat
Linking functional ingredients and health claims to AI
As interest in functional food builds, manufacturers want to be ahead of the curve. But is conventional research still the best tool we have to identify up-and-coming trends? In Israel, Tastewise is instead betting on AI-powered algorithms to do the work for us. Join CEO and co-founder Alon Chen as he outlines what’s hot and what’s not in functional foods and health claims, and the increasingly important role of AI in developing better-for-you products.
Speaker: Alon Chen, CEO and co-founder, Tastewise
11:20am Panel discussion
Functional food & drink: The ingredients promising health and wellness
From prebiotics to CBD, nootropics and collagen, new ingredients are popping up on food and drink labels. Health-conscious consumers are driving the functional food trend, but with ‘wellness’ meaning different things to different people, the space is becoming crowded. We cut through the noise to ask what consumers want from functional food and drink, and how those need states can best be met.
Speakers:
- Susie Macarthur, COO, Tenacious Labs
- Kerensa Broersen, senior project manager, food digestion and analytics, NIZO Food Research
- Amy Moring, CEO and co-founder, Hunter & Gather
- Steven Van Middelem, founder, FHIRST Living Soda
Positive Nutrition: Healthy Innovation for the Mass Market 12-14 March
Over three days and six sessions, the interactive broadcast series will ask how industry can leverage innovation to produce healthier food and drink.
Food and beverage manufacturers are under more pressure than ever to deliver nutritious food for the mass market. At the same time, the concept of ‘healthy’ is changing. Where once shoppers were laser focused on low fat, salt and sugar, today’s consumer want that and more.
Which better-for-you trends are resonating most with consumers? And how can manufacturers best align this new future of wellness to mainstream categories, from snacking to drinks and convenience food?
Positive Nutrition will be broadcast over three days 12-14 March 2024. Each day the morning session will start at 11am CET and the afternoon session from 3pm CET.
For more information on the programme, speakers, or to register, visit the Positive Nutrition homepage.
12 March 2024
11am CET – Reformulation & Fortification: Changing Trends in Healthier Foods
'Unhealthy’ foods are in the spotlight, with shoppers wanting better-for-you alternatives. With these same consumers unwilling to compromise on taste, food manufacturers have a challenge on their hands: how can ‘baddies’ best be removed, and beneficial ingredients added, with positive nutrition in mind?
3pm CET – Plant-Based Under the Microscope
The plant-based market has boomed in the last decade, with projections it will double in value by 2030. But the recent dramatic slowdown suggests the category is not hitting the mark with shoppers. With health a major driver behind decisions to reduce meat and dairy intake, is the plant-based category’s associations with overprocessing and ‘unclean’ ingredients muddying its reputation? How can manufacturers improve the nutritional credentials of plant-based milk and dairy?
13 March 2024
11am CET – Food as Medicine
Today’s consumers are not turning to food and drink for energy alone. A more nuanced understanding of the relationship between diet and health is coming to shape consumer attitudes to food. So which ingredients offer greatest potential in health and wellness? We ask how the latest nutritional science is informing functional food and beverage trends.
3pm CET – Personalised Nutrition: Tapping into Data for Healthier Diets
Developments in personalised nutrition – whereby individualised dietary advice is offered based on genetic, environmental and lifestyle factors – continue apace. The market is forecast to grow to over $16bn by 2027. From measuring blood sugar responses to microbiome diversity, how is this novel sector expected to evolve? Can personalisation ever prove a boon for the masses?
14 March
11am CET – Food for Kids
Europe continues to struggle with high levels of childhood obesity. But as understanding around the importance of early years nutrition grows, so too does the opportunity for manufacturers to meet demands for health and functionality. How can industry best support carers and babies in the first 1,000 days, and help set kids up for a healthy future?
3pm CET – Free-From
The free-from category is changing shape as more and more people follow restricted diets. These days consumers are not only turning away from common allergens gluten and shellfish, but also other widely used ingredients from soy to nuts and dairy. As an increasing number of people eliminate popular ingredients from their diets, what opportunities are opening up in the free-from space?
