Attitudes of consumers to functional foods during the COVID-19 pandemic period

In this study, the New Coronavirus Covid-19 disease, which first emerged in China in 2019 and spread all over the world in a short time, was tried to be conveyed by using the consumers' attitudes towards functional foods, the literature review and a descriptive research model based on quantitative data. The aim of the study is to reveal the attitudes, awareness and acceptance of consumers towards functional foods during the Covid-19 pandemic process, and to create a perspective for consumers in all age groups. In the study, an online questionnaire method was used for 200 people residing in Istanbul to measure the opinions of consumers about the level of knowledge, awareness and conformity towards functional foods. It was determined that the majority of the participants were 55.0% of individuals between the ages of 25-34, 66.5% of individuals with a university education level and 67.5% of women working in the education sector. While 72.5% of the participants in the study stated that they had not heard of the concept of functional food, 76.0% stated that they did not have any knowledge about these foods. Among the functional foods they know most, probiotic yoghurts (99.0%), kefir products and herbal teas at the same rate (98.5%), cereal biscuits in terms of fiber (98.0%), fruit juices with increased vitamins (97.0%) is coming.

A Sustainable Approach for the Development of Innovative Products from Fruit and Vegetable By-Products

The waste generated by small-scale ultra-fresh juice producers, such as bistros and restaurants, has been little studied so far, mainly because it is unevenly distributed and dissipated in the economic ecosystem and would require high costs associated with transportation and subsequent recovery of bio composites. The present article seeks to offer solutions by providing sustainable methods to reduce their waste losses to a minimum and transform them into valuable products, with affordable equipment and techniques. The study focuses on the preliminary phase of quantitative analysis of fruit and vegetable by-products generated on a small scale, the results showing a mean 55% productivity in fresh juices. Due to the high amount of remnant water content in waste, a new process of mechanically pressing the resulting squeezed pulp was introduced, generating an additional yield in juice, ranging from 3.98 to 51.4%. Due to the rising trend in healthier lifestyle, the by-products were frozen or airdried for conservation in each of the processing stages, and the total phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity were analyzed in order to assess the traceability of these bioactive compounds to help maximize their transfer into future final products. The polyphenols transferred into by-products varied between 7 and 23% in pulps and between 6 and 20% in flours. The highest DPPH potential was found in flours, up to three-fold in comparison with the raw material, but the high dry substance content must be accounted for. The results highlight the potential of reusing the processing waste as a reliable source of bioactive compounds.