Natural colors and flavors: Roadmap to a bursting market

Rising consumer demand for Clean Label ingredients has been a huge influence on the food industry for several years now. To offer suitable solutions for this growing market, producers of colors and flavors have committed major investments in creating natural alternatives to synthetic materials. Food ingredients Europe & Natural ingredients 2017 scheduled from 28 to 30 November in Frankfurt, offers a clear overview of a sector that has developed like few others in the food and ingredients industries.

Fi Europe and Ni together have 1500 suppliers showcasing their products this year; 350 will be presenting innovations in colors and flavors

Solutions for an expanding and complex market

What began in the ‘80s with initial concerns about synthetic colors in food has led to today’s dominating demand for natural colors. As a result, nearly 60% of the total food colors market is now comprised of natural solutions, according to Future Market Insights.

In parallel, Clean Label has affected the global flavors market, and both color and flavor producers have responded with innovation and investments in R&D. “Consumers are highly sceptical about artificial additives, especially those carrying E-numbers. They avoid products with long, complex ingredient lists and have a strong wish for greater naturalness in food”, says Guido de Jager, Head of Group Marketing at GNT. For suppliers, natural colors and flavors today are part of their standard portfolio. Nevertheless, achieving successful results while reverting back to all things natural, is far from simple. Attaining Clean Label status requires standardised raw materials of the highest quality – a challenge when it comes to ingredients made by Mother Nature. In addition, stability concerns still exist around long-term or high temperature warehousing. Paul Janthial, director of the Food & Beverage Business Unit at Naturex, says: "Every natural pigment has its own specific properties in terms of heat or pH sensitivity, light stability and solubility. In order to find the right solution efficiently, the most important thing is not to focus only on the desired shade or color intensity but to share from the very beginning all relevant details about the application matrix and the process applied to it.”

With thousands of products presented in the colors and flavors categories and a high quality conference program, Fi Europe & Ni is the roadmap for the whole natural solutions sector. Barbara Lezzer, European Marketing Director at Sensient Flavors, says: “Consumers nowadays shouldn’t have to accept a compromise between health and taste – they want it all. This is why the focus of all of our research and development is to offer natural solutions based on our proprietary extraction and taste modulation technologies. FIE gives us the opportunity to share our latest developments and capabilities, to bring new product concepts to life in various sweet beverage categories.”

Fi conference and exhibitors: innovation at a glance

During the four-day Fi conference, visitors can experience concentrated knowledge and market insights. On 28 November under the headline “Clean Label & Natural Ingredients”, experts from university and industry as well as market analysts will explore subjects such as the consumer’s view of Clean Label, and technical topics from stability issues in natural colors to reformulation. “Reduction & Reformulation” on 30 November will cover sugar reduction with case studies and speeches focusing on innovative solutions without loss of flavor or functionality.

Fi Europe & Ni organiser UBM has announced a record number of exhibitors for 2017, with 1,500 suppliers. More than 350 of them will present over 2,500 products in the colors or flavors categories. The exhibitor list ranges from flagships like GNT, SVZ, Naturex, Sensient and Symrise as well as innovative newcomers such as La Tourangelle, FoodSolutionsTeam and Aroma’s Lecocq.