Europeans demand healthy food
The European market for functional foods is growing at 10% a year, according to new research from RTS Resource.
Such health-giving products are significantly outperforming the overall EU food and drink market, which is growing at 1.3% in value and 0.6% in volume, said RTS.
By 2012, the market could be worth Euro 18.2bn (up from Euro 13bn now), with the fastest growth in hot beverages, cereals and baked goods, it predicted.
While big brands had given the market some coherence, it remained fragmented, said RTS md Steve Rice, who has just conducted exclusive research for FIHN on targeting foods for consumers at different 'life stages'. However, more scientific research was needed if the market was to diversify further and manufacturers wanted to secure regulatory approval for health claims, said Rice.
Indeed, much of the discussion at FIHN's Life Stage Nutrition conference (see pages 6-7 for a full report) addressed the fundamental problem that food firms did not have the cash to support the kind of clinical research needed to substantiate health claims. If research was funded by taxpayers or through industrial collaborations, however, individual firms would get no competitive advantage because everyone would benefit, said Unilever's Dr Mark Cobain. "If the pharmaceutical industry is being pushed to focus on endpoints in research rather than biomarkers of disease risk, such as cholesterol, then we will also be pushed down that road. But we are not operating on the same kind of margins."
To buy the report, log onto http://www.foodmarketreports.com or call RTS +44 (0) 1902 422 282
