Mineral fortification: how functional ingredient can enhance your health

Rising living standards, globalization and, more generally, urbanization have favored less healthy lifestyles, with access to "easier", higher-calorie food and a need for less daily exercise (delivery, car, transport). In addition, non-communicable diseases (cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes...) and psychological illnesses (depression) have increased, raising concerns among consumers.

As a result, people are focusing more and more on consuming healthy, nutrient-rich products that can prevent the risk of these diseases. Functional ingredients, which meet these needs by offering disease-preventing properties, are becoming increasingly recognized and desired by consumers.

Therefore, demand for these functional foods has been growing for several years. According to future market insights, the functional food ingredients market is valued at US$ 112.60 Billion in 2023 and is projected to reach US$ 215.36 Billion by 2033.

But what exactly is a functional ingredient?

The term "functional ingredients" is used to describe foods or food ingredients that provide health benefits beyond meeting basic nutrition needs.

In essence, functional ingredients are bioactive compounds, can be found naturally in various foods or are added as functional components where they are designed to harness their specific health benefits (like flavonoids, prebiotics and probiotics, vitamins, or minerals, to name but a few).

Galactic offers a range of mineral lactates that includes calcium, zinc, iron, and magnesium. They all possess excellent solubility, neutral taste, and high bioavailability. In addition, each of our minerals target specific health issues from healthy bones to an improved immune system, to name a few.

Galactic’s product portfolio

In response to consumer demand and to contribute to a healthier world nutrition, Galactic offers natural innovative mineral solutions.

Minerals are inorganic elements naturally present in soil and water and are important for the body's health. Depending on the needs of the human organism, dietary minerals are of two types: macro-minerals, which are required in large quantities (e.g., calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, sodium, potassium, and sulfur), and micro-minerals or oligo-minerals, which are required in very small quantities (e.g., chromium, cobalt, iron, fluorine, or zinc).

In mineral fortification and supplementation, Galactic focused on 4 key areas:

•  Calcium
•  Iron
•  Zinc
• Magnesium

Indeed, Galactic has developed an innovative solution to address the challenge of integrating sufficient levels of calcium necessary for a healthy diet: Galaxium. It is the most optimal source of calcium for efficient calcium fortification.

Additionally Galactic offers an extensive choice under the Galanium range which is based on lactic acid (Iron, Zinc and Magnesium).

All these products offer:

• Natural sources of mineral: Lactic acid is an organic compound produced by the fermentation of sugars and is naturally present in many food products. As the human body at any time contains approximately 125g to 150g lactic ions, its salts are easily metabolized and hence highly recommended as sources of minerals.
• High solubility: Thanks to their excellent solubility and neutral taste, Galaxium Pearls and Galanium lactate salts are used in both solid and liquid applications and don’t need a stabilizer when used.
• Excellent bioavailability: Bioavailability is a term used in pharmacology and nutrition to describe the amount of a substance (such as a nutrient or medicine) that actually reaches the body's bloodstream after administration. In other words, it's a measure of how much of a substance is absorbed and used by the body, relative to the total amount administered. Thanks to their high solubility, organic salts are more bioavailable than inorganic salts and are therefore preferable. Lactates are thus recommended as ideal counter-ions to accompany the cations chosen in nutritional supplementation strategies. This means that lactates are often used for other nutrients, as they facilitate their absorption by the body.
• Neutral taste and odor: Unlike many sources of minerals, lactate salts are both tasteless and odorless. Therefore, they do not affect the sensorial profile of the final products. For example, citrates and gluconates have both an acidic and bitter taste while carbonates bring a chalky taste.

And available in both powder and pearls format, it can be easily used by food producers in:

• Bakery
• Beverages
• Meat
• Fish and seafood