Novel Foods and Neophobia: Evidence from Greece, Cyprus, and Uganda

Paraskevi Tsimitri,Konstantinos Gkatzionis,Ediriisa Mugampoza,Efstratios Loizou,Stefanos A Nastis,Fani Th Mantzouridou,Anastasios Michailidis

doi:10.3390/resources11010002

Abstract

The exploitation of agri-food industrial by-products to produce novel foods is a promising strategy in the framework of policies promoting the bioeconomy and circular economy. Within this context, this study aims to examine the effect of food neophobia and food technology neophobia in the acceptance of a novel food by consumers (through an EU research project: Sybawhey). As a case study, a functional yogurt-like product was developed by synergistic processing of halloumi cheese whey, enriched with banana by-products. The present study contributes to the literature by examining consumers’ perceptions for such a novel food, identifying the profile of potential final users and classifying them according to their “neophobic tendency”. A comparative approach among groups from Greece, Cyprus and Uganda was adopted to explore whether respondents have a different attitude towards this novel yogurt. Results suggest that there is a potential for increasing consumption of novel foods derived by agri-food industrial by-products, but more information about the importance of using by-products are required to enhance consumers’ acceptance of this novel food. Such results may be useful to policy makers, aiming to promote strategies towards the effective reuse of food outputs leading to the manufacture of sustainable novel foods.

Highlights

Sustainable food systems that facilitate the valorization of food waste and by-product streams to produce new raw materials for the manufacturing of safe, healthy, and nutritious food are vital [1]
Within the increasing interest in analyzing food phobia and technophobia, our results suggest that the methods employed are a suitable instrument to profile the phobia towards novel foods and new food technologies and to measure acceptance of novel foods produced accompanied with food phobia and technophobia variables, constituting a valid alternative methodology as it can facilitate the application and analysis internationally
Our results confirm that the nine-item version of the food neophobia scale (FNS) and the Food Technology Neophobia Scale (FTNS) may be a proper instrument in developing countries

Summary

Introduction

Sustainable food systems that facilitate the valorization of food waste and by-product streams to produce new raw materials for the manufacturing of safe, healthy, and nutritious food are vital [1]. Through the bioeconomy and circular economy contexts, the ambition of novel food policies is to transform by-products and waste into useful raw materials for industrial applications. In this direction, by-products from dairy industries (e.g., whey) receive great attention in sustainable food management. With the objective to increase the sustainability of the banana sector, banana utilization into high-value products, making use of novel food technologies and current trends in the food manufacture, is a challenge

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion