Global market for food additives set to grow

Food additives have myriad roles in food processing.

They’re added to food to improve taste, extend shelf life and prevent the growth of microbes, explains Global Industry Analysts Inc.

They help maintain quality, texture, consistency, taste, odour, alkalinity/acidity, or serve any technological function related to food, such as act as a processing aid.

With such an important roster of functions, it’s no wonder that the global market for food additives is expected to exceed US$33.9 billion by 2015.

This is just one of the conclusions Global Industry Analysts came to in its recently released Food Additives: A Global Strategic Business Report.

Reasons for growth

The growth in the food additives market can be attributed to several factors.

For one thing, more and more developing countries are adopting sophisticated food processing methods.

In fact, Global Industry Analysts predicts that demand for food additives will come mainly from outside the West as processed foods are rising in popularity.

Other factors stimulating growth include the fact that food processing companies are restructuring and that food processors are demanding more complicated food ingredients.

Europe, U.S. dominate market

The report found that the U.S. and Europe dominate the world food additives market.

American consumers, says Global Industry Analysts, are particularly conscious of calorie content.

For this reason, low-calorie, low-fat foods are popular in the U.S. and in turn create demand for fat replacers, artificial sweeteners, and hydrocolloids.

In Europe, the food additives market is growing as consumers are becoming more health conscious, more concerned about food safety and want more convenience.

Also in Europe, the high obesity rates and desire for natural food products are other factors driving demand for natural additives and fat replacers.

Both the U.S. and European markets remain the largest for flavours/flavour enhancers.

More about the report

The report analyzes the worldwide markets for food additives in millions of US$ by the following product segments:

• Acidulants
• Fat Replacers
• Sweeteners (Intense Sweeteners, Bulk Sweeteners)
• Vitamins and Minerals
• Colourants (Natural/Uncertified, Synthetic/Certified)
• Flavours/Flavour Enhancers
• Hydrocolloids
• Emulsifiers
• Preservatives (Anti-microbial, Anti-oxidants)
• Enzymes

The report provides separate comprehensive analytics for the U.S., Canada, Japan, Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East, Latin America, and Rest of the World.

Annual estimates and forecasts are provided for each region for the period of 2007 through 2015.