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DCA Publikationer Health promoting compounds in vegetables and fruit. DJF rapport Havebrug, nr. 29, 2002 Af Kirsten Brandt, Danmarks JordbrugsForskning & Björn Åkesson, Lund University, Sweden  "Health promoting compounds in vegetables and fruit"
The report comprises the contributions made by scientists and companies to a workshop on the identification and utilisation of naturally occurring bioactive compounds with beneficial effects on human health. It was held 6-8 November 2002-07-25 at Smålandshavet Conference Centre, Karrebæksminde, Denmark It is well known that a high consumption of vegetables and fruit affords a protection against cancer, heart attacks and other important diseases. However, it has also become clear, that in developed countries it is not a simple question of deficiencies in known plant-derived vitamins, minerals and antioxidants. We simply don't know which components in plants are the most important for human health. Due to this, it is difficult to make further developments on the effects of food on health, It is also virtually impossible to predict if a change in practice regarding processing and distribution of food has consequences for consumer health. A possible explanation is that plants contain other natural bioactive compounds, which provide benefits for health when present in the diet in relevant amounts, even though they are not essential nutrients. However, the methods normally used in nutrition research are not well suited to investigate compounds that are not essential for human health, and where the effects on human physiology are as of yet only vaguely defined. Moreover, most bioactive plant compounds are known or suspected as toxicants. For these, often no studies have been made of their possible health promoting effects, and when this is done, particular attention must be made to concentration dependency. It is necessary to combine methods and results from research on herbal medicine and on plant health with human nutrition research and studies on food processing. The most urgent need concerns preliminary studies to identify the compounds that have the greatest potential for improvements of the health value of food, and thus should be selected for further study. The workshop aimed to provide an opportunity for scientists and companies to: · Present and discuss recent progress in relevant research on identification and understanding "new" bioactive compounds. · Present and discuss commercial opportunities for the food sector, including technical and market aspects. · Establish relevant links and clusters among scientists and companies within this topic. The costs of the workshop was supported by a grant from the Øresund Food Network, the area "Food and Health", as well as by part of a grant from the Programme Committee for Research on Nutrition and Food (FELFO) of the Board of the Danish Research Councils to a multidisciplinary FØTEK 3 project on the same subject, the results of which were presented at the workshop. |