The Functional Foods Revolution - Healthy People, Healthy Profits?

The concept of "functional foods"--foods that promote human health beyond basic nutrition--has caught the imagination of the global food industry. All the major household name food companies are developing and marketing functional foods and ingredients as key drivers in their global business strategies.

Driven by big business ambition and scientists staking out new frontiers in nutrition science, the functional foods revolution is attracting both controversy and praise. The authors set out to explain the contradictory responses to functional foods and how and why such dilemmas arise, using a wealth of detailed food policy case study material from Europe, Japan, and the United States.

From their global analysis the authors argue that many of these companies' business strategies and assumptions are seriously flawed. yet they are also able to draw on success stories to offer a radical solution--nothing less than a new business model for the future of functional foods, a model the authors call The Healthful Company.