In celebration of providing the South and southern African sugar industry with more than 20 years of accredited quality analysis of mixed juice, molasses and sugar

The Sugar Milling Research Institute NPC (SMRI) has provided the South and southern African sugar industry with analytical services for more than 50 years. The need for an internationally-recognised quality assurance system to provide SMRI members and their customers with the necessary confidence in the results that they were receiving was recognised more than 25 years ago, and it culminated in the SMRI Analytical Services Division achieving ISO/IEC Guide 25:1990 accreditation in 1998. The SMRI analytical laboratory has since successfully progressed through the ISO/IEC 17025:1999 and ISO/IEC 17025:2005 iterations to the current ISO/IEC 17025:2017 standard. The SMRI has therefore had to continually expand the scope of its systems over the past 25 years, in order to match the updated requirements. The system is used for the analysis of weekly composite mixed juice and final molasses samples from all the SMRI South African member mills and some southern African member mills. Similarly, raw and white sugar analyses are conducted, with the reporting of results to the members' specifications. Critical to the accuracy of these results is the continual auditing and monitoring of the methods, equipment and chemical solutions that are used in the analysis methods. This is achieved by using Certified Reference Materials and control samples, as well as participating in internationally-recognised analytical proficiency schemes. Critical to the success of the laboratory in maintaining its accreditation is the competence of the laboratory staff who undergo continual training and assessments. This was demonstrated in 2020 and 2021, when they were able to continue providing the necessary services, despite the challenges faced during the Covid pandemic.

The Impact of the COVID-19 Lockdown on Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Consumption in Children in Saudi Arabia: A Mixed-Methods Study.

(1) Background: In 2020, there seems to have been a global shift in lifestyle and eating habits with the emergence of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the ensuing lockdowns implemented by national governments. This study assessed the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on SSBs consumption among healthy 6-11 years old children in Saudi Arabia; (2) Methods: This is a mixed-methods study, incorporating a quantitative component, which was a validated Arabic online questionnaire completed by parents, and a qualitative component, involving structured interviews with 10 selected parents using a criterion sampling method; (3) Results: There was a small decrease in consumption reported during lockdown across all SSBs types (soft drinks, n = 58 (13.9%); juices: n = 115 (27.6%); flavored milk: n = 93 (22.3%)). The results showed that with every increase in the dental pain scale there was a positive odd (AOR:0.64; p = 0.001) of decreased consumption of SSBs. Several themes related to increase and decrease SSBs consumption emerged; (4) Conclusions: There was a small decrease in SSBs consumption during lockdown reported by parents. Several themes emerged that can be used to strategize against problematic eating behavior, enabling such provisions as family dietary interventions, which target both parents and children.

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.

Impact of Clarified Apple Juices with Different Processing Methods on Gut Microbiota and Metabolomics of Rats.

The consumption of processed foods has increased compared to that of fresh foods in recent years, especially due to the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. Here, we evaluated the health effects of clarified apple juices (CAJs, devoid of pectin and additives) processed to different degrees, including not-from-concentrate (NFC) and from-concentrate (FC) CAJs. A 56-day experiment including a juice-switch after 28 days was designed. An integrated analysis of 16S rRNA sequencing and untargeted metabolomics of cecal content were performed. In addition, differences in the CAJs tested with respect to nutritional indices and composition of small-molecule compounds were analyzed. The NFC CAJ, which showed a higher phenolic content resulting from the lower processing degree, could improve microbiota diversity and influence its structure. It also reduced bile acid and bilirubin contents, as well as inhibited the microbial metabolism of tryptophan in the gut. However, we found that these effects diminished with time by performing experiment extension and undertaking juice-switching. Our study provides evidence regarding the health effects of processed foods that can potentially be applied to public health policy decision making. We believe that NFC juices with a lower processing degree could potentially be healthier than FC juice.

Phytochemical Fortification in Fruit and Vegetable Beverages with Green Technologies.

BACKGROUND: Phytochemical, bioactive and nutraceutical compounds are terms usually found in the scientific literature related to natural compounds found in plants linked to health-promoting properties. Fruit and vegetable beverages (mainly juice and smoothies) are a convenient strategy to enhance the consumption of horticultural commodities, with the possibility of being fortified with plant byproducts to enhance the content of bioactive compounds. OBJECTIVE: This review aims to analyse the different green technologies applied in beverage processing with a fortification effect on their health promoting compounds. RESULTS: Fortification can be performed by several strategies, including physical elicitors (e.g., processing technologies), plant/algae extract supplementation, and fermentation with probiotics, among others. Thermal processing technologies are conventionally used to ensure the preservation of food safety with a long shelf life, but this frequently reduces nutritional and sensory quality. However, green non-thermal technologies (e.g., UV, high-pressure processing, pulsed electric fields, ultrasounds, cold plasma, etc.) are being widely investigated in order to reduce costs and make possible more sustainable production processes without affecting the nutritional and sensory quality of beverages. CONCLUSIONS: Such green processing technologies may enhance the content of phytochemical compounds through improvement of their extraction/bioaccessibility and/or different biosynthetic reactions that occurred during processing.