First use dated back 2000 years to the Chinese What are they? An extremely diverse group of microorganisms at the origin of the life

At least 30,000 species known from fresh or marine water, of which 100 are studied and only around 10 exploited What about nutrition? Original and alternative source of many essential nutrients: proteins, lipids, vitamins, pigments. And sustainability? At the origin of the food chain

An alternative raw material to marine resources

Inspired by this promising portrait and faithful to its avowed aim of sustainable innovation, the ROQUETTE group took up the challenge of creating an industry devoted to microalgae. The objective is simple: explore this resource, only recently re-discovered, from biodiversity to extraction of compounds of interest via process optimisation. To ensure the success of this large-scale project, ROQUETTE brings together diverse and complementary skills: production, analytics, nutrition, R&D, regulation but also marketing and sales force.

Faced with the desire of populations to preserve their health through the different stages in life and the nutritional priorities of companies, ROQUETTE hopes to offer ingredients or innovative biomass produced by the microalgae industry for the Nutrition and Health fields. These natural and sustainable compounds would be included in the composition of dietary supplements or functional foods.

As evidence of its commitment to this new way, ROQUETTE proposes the first of many ingredients: Chlorella. It is one of the most important species in the microalgal industry. This success is mainly due to its extraordinary complete composition (proteins, vitamins, pigments such as lutein, lipids etc.). Nowadays, the most common way of consuming Chlorella is as a dietary supplement. Indeed, whether in powder or tablet form, this microalga delivers all its nutritional benefits to consumers.

Download the complete press release (PDF document)

The Spring 2010 issue of Nutraceuticals Now is now available.

Excerpts of featured articles are available on this website:

Danisco: Bringing health to everyday life
Lallemand: Innovations in cranberry ingredients
COPALIS: Beauty-from-within marine actives
Dermscan: Biometrological approaches for efficacy evaluation of beauty supplements and foods

In diverse forms (capsule, yoghurt, milk, soup, fruit juice, mineral etc.), any “transformed” - i.e. so-called “functional” - food, and any food supplement which has the express objective of beautifying the external appearance (anti-age, firmness, slimming, fortifying, hair, sun preparation, hair and nail beauty etc.), becomes a multi-faceted product, combining beauty, health and nutrition.

Being closely linked, cosmetics have been largely inspired by the world of nutrition, borrowing from it textures, raw materials and vocabulary.

As food is more and more considered as similar as cosmetics, making the same promise of beauty, in a favourable context where the link between nutrition and health is clearly identified, and consumers are increasingly concerned with their appearance and well-being.

This article is available in full in the Spring 2010 issue of Nutraceuticals Now

Interest in the impact of ageing on the function and appearance of the skin has been increasing. While a new study has recently highlighted the association between daily diet and skin conditions, there is a growing demand for beauty-from-within actives. With 50 years experience in developing marine bioactives, COPALIS research and development team has focused its research for the last few years to design new Sea Solutions® with oral cosmetics activity.

At Vitafoods 2010, the France based company will be glad to introduce its range of marine actives for inner beauty.

While aging skin is a factor of many things-genetics, sun exposure, environmental insults, stress, and more, COPALIS offers beauty-from-within ingredients with targeted activity.

This article is available in full in the Spring 2010 issue of Nutraceuticals Now

UTIs are traditionally treated with antibiotics, however, scientists believe that antibiotic treatments can disrupt the natural occurrence of beneficial bacteria in the body, leading to higher recurrence of UTI. Furthermore, repeated antibiotic treatments can give rise to antibiotic-resistant strains of harmful bacteria. Cranberries are widely documented for their preventive effect against UTI due to their unique anti-adhesion activity against pathogenic bacteria, which is linked to the presence of key phytochemicals: proanthocyanidins (PACs). Today, there is a growing demand for high quality cranberry extracts with high amount of proanthocyanidins to support urinary tract health. Lallemand Health Ingredients, in partnership with leading cranberry expert Decas Botanical Synergies have joined their marketing and R&D efforts to develop high quality cranberry ingredients solutions aimed at meeting this demand.

This article is available in full in the Spring 2010 issue of Nutraceuticals Now

At this year’s event, we will be presenting our portfolio of innovative ingredients that contribute to overall health and well-being and also offer specific solutions in the areas of digestive, immune and bone health, antioxidants and general well-being.

This article is available in full in the Spring 2010 issue of Nutraceuticals Now

This couldn’t have come at a better time for the event, which believe it or not, began as a pavilion within Vitafoods. Since it started, Finished Products Expo has been gradually gaining momentum with both exhibitors and visitors alike. It has taken time, like all events of its nature, but we wanted to ensure we were creating an offering that was tailored perfectly to the needs and requirements of the industry.

Although it has its own hall and entrance, there will still be those valuable cross-over points with Vitafoods to provide exhibitors and visitors with those all-important networking opportunities which, lets face it, are what makes shows like these tick.

One of the comments that always comes back to me after a stint in Geneva is about how great the shows are socially, which is truly refreshing to hear. So a couple of years ago we decided to capitalise on that even further by actually setting- up a bespoke service for Finished Products Expo – The Distributors Wanted Scheme – so that visitors can search and even be contacted by potential distributors before the event. It’s been described as an online matchmaking scheme, which saves visitors valuable time and money.

Nevertheless, there is far more going on than simply networking with industry peers and catching-up with old contacts at Vitafoods and Finished Products Expo. Both shows are known industry-wide as the venues for large-scale innovation launches. All of the major players from the functional foods, functional drinks, dietary supplements and nutraceutical markets converge annually on GENEVA PALEXPO, each one competing healthily with the next for the most cutting-edge product launch. The features that we have at the shows complement this too, with the New Products Zone for example, giving an insight into the next big thing to take the market by storm.

And with innovation the key focus for both Vitafoods and Finished Products Expo, its no surprise that some great business deals have taken place on both show floors over the years. In a niche industry like ours, it’s not impossible to get the majority of the leading players together under one roof and when that happens, it becomes the perfect place to conduct serious business deals, many of which can – and have – shaped the industry forever.

So hopefully this year we’re on course to achieve more of the same. With the recession behind us and a mood of optimism sweeping the industry, there’s no reason why the 2010 installments of these shows can’t be the biggest and best yet. All the initial signs are there that both are set to break records – so watch this space!

Finished Products Expo and Vitafoods take place on 18-20 May 2010 at the Geneva Palexpo, Geneva, Switzerland. Visit www.finishedproductsexpo.com or www.vitafoods.eu.com for more information.
Chris Lee
Event Director, Finished Products Expo

The November / December 2009 issue of Nutraceuticals Now is now available.

Excerpts of featured articles are available on this website:

Frutarom: Healthy, Natural Ways to fight Obesity
Barry Callebaut: All the Goodness of the Cocoa Bean
BENEO-Orafti: Responds to Obesity the Natural Way

In contrast to this over-all trend, there is a growing proportion of the population who are becoming more health conscious and concerned about their weight, so are demanding alternative food products that will help them lead a healthier lifestyle. Yves Servotte, member of the executive board of the BENEO-Group reviews the latest trends and observations and highlights the innovative opportunities the group’s ingredients can offer food manufacturers.

This article is available in full in the November / December 2009 issue of Nutraceuticals Now

However, recent breakthroughs are pointing to the effectiveness of these powerful compounds in protecting the skin against the harmful effects of UV radiation. The best news is that one company has succeeded in developing a process, which preserves the activity of these cocoa flavanols in chocolate. In fact, Barry Callebaut’s patented ACTICOATM chocolate is the only chocolate with a guaranteed minimum content of antioxidant flavanols.

Barry Callebaut has developed a unique process to preserve these compounds in the best possible form: the finest quality chocolate.

This article is available in full in the November / December 2009 issue of Nutraceuticals Now