The revenue generated in the functional foods market is projected to increase in the next few years to 441.56 billion USD by 2022(Statista, 2018) due to an increased consciousness on health (Baum, 2018). It is likely that people restrict themselves to what is labelled as functional foods which could result in over consumption of a particular nutrient, leading to adverse effects. A case in point would be the overconsumption of vitamin C when one consumes functional food such as energy bars and oats on top of fruits and vegetables which are also rich in vitamin C. Exceeding the upper limit could lead to digestive problems such as diarrhoea (Katherine Zeratsky, 2018). In addition, restricting to functional food could cause one to neglect other types of food which are also rich in nutrients. People could consume calcium fortified orange juice thinking that it is a substitute for calcium, neglecting other natural food which are also rich in calcium, such as beans and lentils, which contains not just calcium but also other nutrients such as iron and zinc (Healthline, 2018).
Functional foods could be part of one’s healthy diet by making up for the nutrients that is lacking in one’s body due to reasons such as allergies. For instance, by having probiotic yogurt in a diet helps in better digestion (McCoy, 2018). For those who are allergic to seafood could be missing out on omega 3 fatty acids that are found primarily in fatty fish such as tuna. By consuming omega-3 eggs, people allergic to seafood can consume this nutrient without causing an allergic reaction. (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 2009). Research is currently ongoing on fungi and algal fermentation so that these food would also contain omega 3 fatty acid (Ji, X., Ren, L., & Huang, H, 2015). In future if this research is successful, this could provide more food options for those with seafood allergy.
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In the next few years, it is likely that new functional food products would be released into the market. One would be the use of mushrooms in functional food as it has many active compounds which is beneficial for our health. In future, mushrooms could replace cereal flour as it has dietary fibre which is not present in cereal flour (Cutcliffe, 2017). Peels and seeds from melon which contain rich amounts of minerals are potential ingredients for novel functional food (Silva, M. A., Albuquerque, T. G., Alves, R. C., Oliveira, M. .., & Costa, H. S., 2018). However future research has to be conducted to ensure that evidence are conclusive for melon by products to be used as functional food ingredients.
