Infant nutrition: Organic label remains strong as ingredients targeting gut, brain and immunity emerge

12 May 2022 --- The first 1,000 days after birth has been underscored as a critical window for nutrition. “Many scientists agree diet, lifestyle and other factors during this period affect our physical and mental health throughout our lives – including our risk for various diseases,” says Kyoko Saito, marketing representative for Morinaga Milk.

NutritionInsight speaks to Tradin Organic, Valio and De Novo Dairy on the latest trends in the important category. Organic and traceable solutions are common themes emphasizing product safety. Meanwhile, specific ingredients for digestive, cognitive and immune health are also emerging within infant formula.

Organic marches on
The demand for nutritional organic baby food fruit ingredients is an ongoing trend, highlights Lambert van Bemmel, fruit and vegetables trader at Tradin Organic. 

Innova Market Insights found that the top positioning for baby food in North American and European launches between July 2020 and December 2021 was “organic.” 

Moreover, new taste profiles are hitting the shelves to provide more diverse sources of nutrition. 

“We are seeing lots of exciting new varieties of mango, pumpkin and other fruit and vegetables coming up on the market,” remarks van Bemmel. 

Interest in naturality, food safety, traceability and purity of milk, as well as other key raw materials, is high, adds Michael Healy, customer development manager at Valio. 

“Organic products are growing, but also we see convenience as a key trend at the moment.”

Last December, Gerber came out with fruit and veggie purees in seasonal varieties to get babies aged between four and eight months conveniently accustomed to new foods. 

The infant microbiome is colonized within the baby’s first few years of life.“Transparency Triumphs”
In addition to organic, there is a strong trend toward the request for transparency of the supply chain within infant nutrition, highlights van Bemmel. 

“The demand for a reliable and proven supply chain has never been so strong, especially with the post-COVID-19 shipment issues.” 

Supply challenges over the past few years have resulted in products like rice flour rising in costs by 700% to 800%, Arjan Geerlings, new business development manager at Herba Ingredients, pointed out at Fi Europe last year.

Geerlings explained that Europe consumes more rice than it can produce, and local production is prioritized for baby food applications. 

“Baby food manufacturers will always require full traceability, sourcing from Europe can guarantee that. When buying from Asia, everything is mixed together in the same container – there is no view on which farm it’s sourced from.” 

Traceability has also recently been highlighted in infant formula in light of bacterial contamination that led to one death. 

Jumpstarting the microbiome 
Digestive health is a particular area of focus in infant nutrition since babies must establish their microbiome in the first years of life. 

Saito stresses that colonization with bifidobacteria is believed to play pivotal roles in immune, digestive and metabolic systems maturation. 

“Therefore, continuous bifidobacteria intake is very important.”

She notes that it is also important to expand the possibilities and opportunities by combining other functional ingredients including prebiotics such as lactulose, galactooligosaccharides (GOS), fructooligosaccharides (FOS), inulin, postbiotics and immune-supporting lactoferrin.

When looking at which types of bifidobacteria, she recommends human residential bifidobacteria (HRB). 

HRB strains are superior to non-HRB in many physiological activities in their ability to utilize carbohydrates such as human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs), tolerate lysozymes and produce key beneficial metabolites such as folic acid and aromatic lactic acid (ILA). 

Tummy-safe products Plant-based milks are gaining traction, but are lacking in animal-based molecules that bring them closer to human milk.
Innovation is also steered toward products that are more gentle on babies’ digestion. 

“Gut comfort is an increasing area in infant milk formula,” says Dr. Anu Turpeinen, nutrition research manager at Valio. “In Asia, in particular, there are an increasing amount of lactose-free products in the infant formula category, and this could be interesting for toddler ages when lactose intolerance becomes more common.”

Kerry, meanwhile, has flagged plant-based infant nutrition as a growing area of innovation, particularly for infants who suffer from intolerance to cow milk allergy. 

Concentrating on cognition 
Creating an all plant-based product will have its disadvantages, however, according to Turpeinen. She argues that cow’s milk has certain similarities with breast milk that plant formulas alone would struggle to accomplish.  

For example, the milk fat globule membrane (MFGM) is a unique component of mammal milk fat and is not found in vegetable oils. 

“MGFM is a source of bioactive lipids, such as phospholipids, gangliosides and cholesterol,” she says. 

“Cow’s milk fat also contains natural oleic-palmitic-oleic (OPO), which is a major triglyceride also in breast milk. OPO is missing from vegetable oils and has been shown to enhance cognitive development, immune function and gut well-being.”

Precision fermentation is helping produce specific bioactives like lactoferrin for infant formula. Enter technology?
New advances are making it more feasible to incorporate specific bioactive components into infant formula, which could open doors for closer-to-breast plant-based options or cell-based formulas. 

South Africa-based De Novo Dairy, for example, is working with precision fermentation to produce high-value, immune-regulating proteins, which are currently “very expensive.” 

“Using our technology, we can produce these proteins more efficiently, and ultimately much cheaper, allowing them to be used more widely in infant formulas,” says Leah Bessa co-founder and chief strategy officer at De Novo Dairy.

 In addition to immune-regulation proteins, she notes there are certain proteins in breast milk that have iron carrying capabilities.

“These have a fundamental role in transporting iron correctly around the body, improving the bioavailability of iron. We can make them using our technology, allowing for the optimum bioavailability of iron.”

TurtleTree labs is also working on specific bioactives for infant nutrition, with plans for its cell-based lactoferrin and HMOs to be the company’s first functional ingredients to market. 

Looking ahead, Valio’s Healy puts forth that cow’s milk is expected to remain an essential raw material in formula but admits that new technologies will have the possibility to “humanize” infant formula in the future.

Bessa describes a similar vision, where future infant formula will use cow or plant milk as an affordable source of macronutrients, with cellular agriculture filling in the nutritional gaps by producing very specific, important bioactive components.

By Missy Green