Digestion is a key driver for the LATAM nutrition markets: Mintel
According to market intelligence provider Mintel’s report on Vitamins and Supplements - Opportunities and New Consumer Demands in Brazil from November 2019, 32% of interviewees who have taken vitamins and/or supplements in the past 12 months would take vitamins and/or supplements for digestion/intestine flow enhancer, for example, fiber and probiotics, Mintel’s Ana Paula Gilsogamo explained.
In addition, 43% of interviewees had not taken vitamins and/or supplements in the past 12 months but stated they would try vitamins and/or supplements for their digestion/intestine flow enhancing properties.
Gut and brain health
Nutrition for both our guts and brains are important to consumers, who want to understand more about the connection between our gut and brain health via prebiotics and probiotics.
Infant and children’s nutrition is an accessible and opportunistic market in the gut and brain health sphere. Infant milk formulators are, for example, investing and exploring ingredient choices, patent activities and launches in the gut and brain space.
The infant milk formula segment is seeing genomic innovations that use DNA exploration and discovery to offer mothers and their children increasingly personalized nutrition products.
Almost 70% of the global share of patent inventions centering on infant formula appears to revolve around actively alleviating gut-related problems or highlighting the engagement between the gut and the brain, Rick Miller, a leading analyst in the food and drink sector explained to Mintel.
Sustainable sports nutrition
The sports nutrition category is evolving as manufacturers and marketers delve into plant-based and sustainable varieties to reflect the increasing emphasis on the wider holistic wellness market.
Witnessing strong growth, plant-based solutions and sustainability in sports nutrition are carving out a unique niche from active lifestyles by offering genuinely personalized nutrition options for athletes and sport consumers.
Special media purpose-led nutrition
Creating and marketing nutritional options for the Foods for Special Medical Purposes (FSMPs) segment is also seeing a spike in popularity, following calls to protect the environment by considering the entire production process and supply chain.
Therefore, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are exerting pressure on healthcare to increase the sustainability of systems and solutions, along with efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Looking ahead, the FSMP sector is now seeing clean protein innovations and nutrition that fights inflammation.
Specialized nutrition
NutraIngredients-LATAM recently explored what’s new in specialized nutrition in 2020, revealing that consumers are searching for “hyper-specialized diets and nutrition options”.
Various categories within the functional and specialized nutrition fields are appealing to different demographics including infants and young children, sportspeople and nutrition for medical purposes.
