As FoodNavigator reports, some companies are ready to launch plant-derived nutrient blends targeting the fortified food and meal replacement markets. Its vitamins and minerals, extracted from leaves, flowers, roots, and synthetic mushrooms, guarantee nutrient content, which is said to increase bioavailability and product effectiveness.

Towards Mass Production

Several fortified foods, including breakfast cereals, meal replacements, plant-based milk, bread, and baby formula, contain synthetic nutrients. However, according to BIOVIT, the company that will launch such products, increasing evidence indicates that synthetic vitamins and minerals manufactured in the laboratory have limited or no effect.

The British company has just received government funding from the UK's "Better Food For All" Innovate UK initiative for a £500,000 research and development project in collaboration with Swansea University to conduct what it claims is the world's first study measuring the difference in bioavailability and effectiveness between synthetic and plant-derived nutrients.

BIOVIT will also develop new products for use in food and beverage manufacturing. These are described as stable in the food process, providing guaranteed nutrient content for foods after baking, freezing, and pasteurization.

They hope this will allow mass-market consumer products enriched with plant-derived nutrients for the first time. And because organic certification prohibits the use of synthetic nutrients, BIOVIT believes it will open up fortified food and meal replacement markets to organic products for the first time.

Of course, some companies already produce natural nutrients. "But what we're doing for the first time is doing it in a precisely controlled way," said BIOVIT's founder and CEO, Ky Wright, to FoodNavigator. "We are creating the first plant-derived nutrient blends developed and clinically tested."

One hundred percent of the nutrients used in BIOVIT's products come from organically certified farms. These vitamins and minerals are extracted from leaves, flowers, roots, and mushrooms and then standardized for nutritional content so that they can be used to fortify foods in the same way as synthetic multivitamins.

Meanwhile, while studies on the health benefits of many synthetic nutrients have been inconsistent, weak, or inconclusive, certain synthetic supplements can be beneficial for specific groups of people at risk of nutritional deficiencies.

There's Evidence

"There's some evidence that in some situations, they work, but the way I would look at it is that throughout human existence and evolution, we've been using plant-derived nutrients," responded Wright.

"These synthetic materials have only been around for about 100 years, and while there's evidence that they work in some situations, there's a lot of evidence that in other situations, they don't do anything and can even be harmful. With synthetics, it's a gamble because you're not sure what the effect is. But with plant-derived natural nutrients, we know they work."

The company expects to make its products available to food and beverage manufacturers in the UK, Europe, and the USA starting in the first quarter of 2024.

The Importance of Micronutrients

Citing figures from the at-home health testing company Vitall, BIOVIT claims that at least 60% of people in the UK suffer from at least one severe micronutrient deficiency, leading to a range of health symptoms, including sleep disturbances, low energy, and high rates of illness.

Meanwhile, malnutrition is a major global problem, with a global economic impact of £2.86 trillion per year, or £409 per person, according to the nutrition charity Bapen.

In England, the annual cost of malnutrition is £19.6 billion, or 15% of total health and social care spending. According to BIOVIT, fortified foods rich in essential nutrients are an obvious and potentially vital tool to help combat malnutrition.

Synthetic Nutrients Are "Misunderstood" by Consumers

Meanwhile, most consumers assume that the nutrients listed on a food product's nutrition panel are indistinguishable from naturally derived plant nutrients. As a result, consumers are expected to demand organic plant-derived nutrients.

"It's an amazing situation," said Wright. "Synthetic nutrients are found in everything from bread, cereals, baby food, plant milk, and meal replacements, and they're not what people expect them to be."

The company surveyed 500 people. Nearly half of them did not know that synthetic nutrients existed. 86%, as soon as they learned there was a difference between synthetic and natural nutrients, said they would prefer to pay more for natural ones.

Wright added, "Millions of people currently rely on synthetic nutrients thinking they are getting the nutrients they believe come from those products, but there hasn't been a study to quantify what their actual effect is on a person."