Resveratrol Food Supplement Products and the Challenges of Accurate Label Information to Ensure Food Safety for Consumers

Abstract

The food supplement market is growing as many consumers wish to complement their nutrient intake. Despite all the regulations in place to ensure food supplements safety, there are still many cases of irregularities reported especially connected to internet sales. Twenty resveratrol food supplement products sold on the Slovenian market were evaluated on their compliance of declared vs. determined resveratrol content, as well as the compliance of labels with the European Union (EU) and Slovenian regulatory requirements. Both the ingredient contents and food information are important parts of food safety. Analyses of 20 food supplements performed using high-performance thin-layer chromatography (HPTLC) coupled with densitometry showed that 95% of products had contents different from what was declared and 55% of products contained higher contents than declared. In 25% of the products the determined content per unit exceeded the maximum level (150 mg/day) specified in EU novel food conditions for food supplement with trans-resveratrol. Evaluation of the 20 food supplement labels included mandatory and voluntary food information, food supplement information, novel food information, health claims and nutrition claims. Most labels contained the necessary information, but multiple errors were observed ranging from typos to misleading practices. From a food safety perspective, there is still a lot of improvement needed in the field of food supplements.

Evaluation of quality parameters and antioxidant activity of commercial melinjo (Gnetum gnemon) for functional food

“…Microwave-assisted extraction has been shown to be an efficient technique for recovering resveratrol from food products 48 . Resveratrol food supplement products should be accurately labeled to ensure food safety for consumers 49 .…”

Surface molecularly imprinted polymers based on magnetic multi‐walled carbon nanotubes for the highly selective purification of resveratrol from crude extracts of Vitis vinifera, Arachis hypogaea, and Polygonum cuspidatum

“…Therefore, resveratrol of natural origin is still preferred in healthy foods. Natural resources of resveratrol are known as Vitis vinifera, Arachis hypogaea, and Polygonum cuspidatum [4]. Conventional methods for purifying resveratrol from natural resources are silica gel column chromatography, membrane separation, macroporous resin, and high-speed countercurrent chromatography [2,5].…”

Does knowledge and concern regarding food supplement safety affect the behavioral intention of consumers? An experimental study on the theory of reasoned action

“…Although there are studies that address food safety and food supplement issues together ( 55 , 56 ), or even aim to explain consumer behavior by using more than one theory together [for example, PMT + TPB ( 22 ); VAB + TPB ( 57 ); TRA + TPB ( 58 )], there is no study that addresses the mentioned issues together, includes food safety knowledge (FSK) and concern in the model and aims to explain consumers’ BIs with the TRA and TPB. In addition, no study has tried to explain FSK and food safety concern (FSC) with the TRA.…”