Sustainable Functional Food Processing

Functional nutrition has become one of the main directions for a healthy lifestyle and sustainable food production due to its promising positive influence on health and its association with the use of raw materials of natural origin [1-3]. Therefore, it has attracted great interest from both consumers and manufacturers concerned about human well-being and sustainable economic growth [4]. Not surprisingly, new socio-demographic trends (e.g., longer life expectancy, promotion of healthy lifestyles, better healthcare, etc.) supported functional sector to become an increasingly lucrative segment of the food industry with a rapidly growing market [5].

Functional foods are industrially processed or unprocessed natural foods that have beneficial health effects beyond their basic nutritional value when consumed regularly [6]. Consumers today are increasingly looking for products that are safe, natural, have Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) status, and are produced using sustainable and/or ecologically sound technologies. For this reason, "functional food" is an increasingly popular term in the social and scientific spheres, so the industry is continuously investing in the development of a sector that can offer products with additional benefits for consumer health. Here, it is important to emphasize that clinical trials (randomized, double-blind, and placebo-controlled) should be conducted for the foods that are to be labeled as "functional" in order to draw conclusions about the health benefits of the products [6].