Health benefits

Health benefits and nutritional impact of food

Consumers are increasingly making food choices based on perceived health benefits and health impact. This means food and ingredient producers can create a distinctive and successful position for themselves in a crowded market by offering healthy food options – for example through novel bioactive ingredients, alternative proteins and milder processing.

While the impact of diet on health is well-accepted in general, any specific claims must be meticulously validated. And that can be a big challenge. Effects are often quite subtle and only apparent over long periods. Moreover, there is huge biological variation between people in terms of what is considered “normal” and how we respond to specific nutrients.