The vast majority of new product development for functional foods featuring probiotics “remains in the dairy space”, but this may be more of a hindrance than a help for the sector’s growth prospects.
Consulting firm Ingredient Identity is working with Bio-gen Extracts, an Indian ingredients supplier, to aid that company’s expansion into the United States and other global markets.
The eight finalists for the Future Food Asia Award have been announced, with the winner of the US$ 100,000 grant set to be announced in Singapore this week.
Looking ahead to the IPA World Congress + Probiota Americas 2017
Understanding how our ancestors lived and how this affected their gut microbiome may boost prebiotic and probiotic formulations, and give companies a compelling story for consumers, says an expert.
Sports nutrition brand Celsius Holdings, backed by a major investment from a Hong Kong businessman, has recorded strong growth for its nascent line of ‘fitness drinks.’v
A new study has demonstrated how dietary interventions with omega-3, prebiotics and other nutrients can help improve motor functions and cognition after the onset of Parkinson's disease in mice.
Consumption of green tea supplements leads to weight loss in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), but it is still uncertain if supplementation provides a direct anti-inflammatory effect against the condition.
The blurring of boundaries between sports nutrition and mainstream food and beverages is fuelling the sector’s growth, alongside new product development (NPD) tackling consumer needs according to their age, gender and lifestyle.
Daily consumption of flavanol-rich cocoa reduced arterial stiffness in postmenopausal women – therefore lowering the risk of heart attacks and strokes, a study revealed.
“We’re good at publishing obesity plans, but not funding action”: That’s how the president of the Nutrition Society of Malaysia Dr E-Siong Tee has described his country’s efforts at improving health in a nation where one-in-two adults are overweight or...
Functional soups featuring botanical and herbal ingredients such as ginger, ginseng and cordyceps are ripe for new product development in Japan, with the ageing population a particularly lucrative target market.
One of the key themes at Food Vision Asia, a high-level industry event in Singapore last week organised by the publisher of FoodNavigator-Asia, concerned the rise of lifestyle diseases in Asia, and particularly the ways companies and institutions have...
According to a senior official at the FSSAI, the food authority has now cast off its reputation as an impregnable fortress whose top-down approach risked alienating food players across India.
Nutritional biochemist and food marketeer Rachel Cheatham looks at five of the biggest global food trends based on her analysis of social media reporting.
Tapping in to the UN’s Sustainable Development goals (SDGs) through fortification, functional products and reformulation can offer the food industry substantial growth opportunities – but more needs to be done to secure private sector financial investment.
Asia’s food and nutrition companies risk turning their backs on a vast potential market if they fail to innovate and reformulate to provide products to help fight the war on diabetes.
Algae can become the world’s first ‘real superfoood’ and, along with edible insect products, help feed the growing global population in a more sustainable and nutritious fashion.
Harnessing the heritage of Traditional Chinese Medicine with modern supplement and functional food trends can help Chinese companies boost growth at home and across Asia – providing it is backed by sound science.
China’s food industry can no longer rely on vast volume growth from mass market items and will increasingly have to focus on innovation around personalised, healthy and functional nutrition products to boost its fortunes.
Saturated fat has been identified as a prime suspect in the onset of osteoarthritis after Australian scientists found it changed the composition of cartilage, but lauric acid from coconut oil has a protective effect.
Korean cactus juice Cheonnyuncho not only decreased constipation in rats, but its soluble fibre content also improved the rodents’ bowel movements, colon thickness and gut microbiota, a study revealed.
The biggest challenge facing the probiotics sector is to spread the word of the potential gains “second generation” products can bring to a broader spectrum of health issues than just gut health.
As Asia's population rapidly ages, opportunities abound for the cognitive health sector, but consumers need to be educated that supplements should be considered before old age.
Alternative sources of protein and a greater focus on ‘food before supplements’ is shaping the sports nutrition practices of Singapore’s elite athletes.
While clinicians are increasingly aware of the evidence behind specific probiotic strains for a variety of conditions, restoring balance to a microbiome disrupted by diet, medications or illness often remains an area of confusion, writes Health World...
Scientists in Singapore have managed to genetically alter some E. coli probiotic strains to sense and kill a harmful gut pathogen, which they say could be used to help protect against certain diseases.
There are more essential fatty acids in the lipids of two species of crickets and a grasshopper from Asia, compared with the yellow mealworm larvae, which is widely reared in Europe for human food.
Major brands and millers have agreed to fortify wheat flour with iron, folic acid and vitamin B12 under India’s drive to boost nutrition levels through a mass fortification programme.
Omega-3 fish oil supplier SeaDragon overcame a raft of challenges to open the world's newest refinery, with the firm now hopeful it can start recouping some of its NZ$11m investment.
From functional food trends in Thailand and Indonesia, to Singapore’s war on diabetes, and the baby water boom in China, here’s a recap of March’s top stories.
A blueberry drink a day can help keep stress away, suggests a study which found blueberry’s antioxidant power improved the cognitive performance of adult rats exposed to stress.
The New Zealand government is committed to helping natural products and supplements firms meet their export potential by removing barriers to innovation, according to the country’s environment minister.
It was the lure of Indonesia’s exotic fruits and their potential as functional ingredients that has convinced Taiwan-based TCI Co to set up an office in Jakarta.
Natural products with functional claims such as honey continue to face a bright future as both a food and a therapeutic product, not least in China where demand is expected to soar.
Specialised diets designed to release large amounts of acetate or butyrate after bacterial fermentation in the colon protected against type 1 or juvenile diabetes in mice, said researchers from Monash University in Australia.
Misleading health claims are still rife in Indonesia despite tighter functional food rules, claims a new association set up to ‘professionalise the industry’.
Large trials are desperately needed to understand if supplements and dietary interventions can play a positive role in the treatment of Crohn’s disease, according to academics in Japan.
With a staggering one million Singaporeans forecast to have type 2 diabetes by 2050 – that’ll be one-sixth of the population – this month’s Nutrition Asia video assesses what is arguably South East Asia’s biggest health crisis.
The recent occasion of the International Women’s Day provided a good opportunity to reflect on both gender equality, but also on differences between the genders, writes DSM senior scientist Barbara Troesch.
Phloretin from apple trees helped ease asthma symptoms in a mouse study, pointing to the bioactive flavonoid’s therapeutic potential, according to researchers in Taiwan.
