Funded under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.3, Theme 10.
Highlights
Development and application of advanced analytical procedures to assess the quality of relevant food product categories in the national context and corresponding analogues implemented according to task 4.1.1 and 4.1.2
In depth characterization of the new products using different approaches (including omics techniques) to get their unique fingerprint (e.g., foodome evaluation) and to compare it to corresponding benchmark.
Identification of consumers' motivations, attitudes, drivers, and barriers towards food innovation to design a strategy for its acceptance (in connection with WP1-WP3, Spoke 1, 3 and 7).
Consumer's acceptance of at least 4 innovative food prototypes (M36)
Application of foodomic approaches for the assessment of composition parameters in at least one existing (M24), two reformulated (M32) and implemented (M36) products of each food category according to task 4.1.1. and 4.1.2.
Consumer beliefs about the risks and benefits of novel foods determine whether they will be accepted or not by the consumer. Factors such as ethical concerns, worries about the potential environmental impact of novel crops or processes, and trust in risk regulators and science are of importance in consumer decision-making. Even if the consumer benefits from a particular functional food are obvious, consumer acceptance might not be automatic and may fail if these issues are not adequately understood. However, product liking and sensory properties are also fundamental in determining consumers' food choices, and it is important to simultaneously consider both elements when evaluating innovative food prototypes. Furthermore, consumers are more and more interested in having information on food’s characteristics in order to guarantee their authenticity, quality and safety. The spectrometry of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) has more and more applications in this field, as it allows to determine in a rapid and repeatable way the metabolomic profile of a food, which is also linked to its qualitative and sensory characteristics.
The aim of the research is to measure consumers' acceptance of novel food prototypes taking into account individual motivations, attitudes, drivers, and barriers towards food innovation. Furthermore, the prototypes will be characterized through an NMR approach.
The activity of this task foreseen the collection of consumer acceptability/willingness to taste at least 4 prototypes of novel food developed by ONFOODS partners (e.g. baked and/or fermented products and/or functional dairy products) and their analysis.
The proposed activities will provide a database of the attitudes, drivers, and barriers towards food innovation of at least 1000 Italian consumers and of consumer acceptability/willingness to taste at least 4 novel food prototypes developed by ONFOODS partners. Furthermore, a database of the metabolomic profile of the prototypes will be established. The main results will be: