Food additives can be direct or indirect. Direct additives are intentionally added during processing for purposes like preservation, texture, and flavor. Indirect additives may be present due to packaging or storage. Additives provide benefits like maintaining nutrition, freshness, texture, acidity, and appearance. They have played an important role in food safety and availability. Regulations require additives to be proven safe before use and subject to ongoing review.

2. Food Additives: Direct and Indirect
Additives and their functions
Jasmine Juliet .R,
Biotechnology Department
Agricultural college and
Research & Institute
Madurai.

3. The different forms of emulsifier lecithin – powder, two
different concentration liquids, granular and powder lecithin

4. Introduction
• Mankind has been adding substances to foods for thousands of years
to preserve them, improve their flavour and appearance, and for
manufacturing convenience foods.
• Theophrastus, a Greek philosopher, reported the use of artificial
flavourings in foods in the 3rd century BC.
• Making convenience foods both varied as well as nutritious and safe,
is now being done using modern technology.
• This technology includes food additives that have been proven both
useful as well as safe.
• Today, more than 2500 different additives are intentionally added to
foods to produce a desired effect.

5. Why Are Food and Color Ingredients
Added to Food?
• To Maintain or Improve Safety and Freshness.
• To Improve or Maintain Nutritional Value.
• Improve Taste, Texture and Appearance

8. Food Additives - Definition
• Food additives are substances added to food to
preserve flavor or enhance its taste, appearance, or other qualities.
• Some additives have been used for centuries; for example,
• preserving food by pickling (with vinegar),
• salting,
• preserving sweets or
• using sulfur dioxide as with wines.

9. Food Additives: Safety and
Regulations
• Since the 19th century, food additives are more widely used.
• Many countries regulate their use.
• For example, boric acid was widely used as a food preservative from the
1870s to the 1920s, but was banned after World War I due to its toxicity.
• However, after the banning of cyclamates in the United States and Britain in
1969, saccharin, the only remaining legal artificial sweetener at the time.
• However, in 2000, saccharin was found to be carcinogenic in rats due only
to their unique urine chemistry.

10. Categories of food additives
 The different types of food additive and their uses include:
 Anti-caking agents – stop ingredients from becoming
lumpy.
 Antioxidants – prevent foods from oxidising, or going
rancid.
 Artificial sweeteners – increase the sweetness.
 Emulsifiers – stop fats from clotting together.

11. Categories of food additives
Flavour enhancers – increase the power of a flavour.
Foaming agents – maintain uniform aeration of
gases in foods.
Mineral salts – enhance texture and flavour.
Preservatives – stop microbes from multiplying and
spoiling the food.

12. Categories of food additives
Food acids – maintain the right acid level.
Flour treatment – improves baking quality.
Raising agents – increase the volume of food
through the use of gases.
Bulking agents – increase the volume of food
without major changes to its available energy.

13. Food Additives: Types
(I) Direct or intentional Food Additives: Direct food
additives are those that are added to a food for a specific
purpose in that food.
 For example, xanthan gum — used in salad dressings,
chocolate milk, bakery fillings, puddings and other foods
to add texture — is a direct additive.
 Most direct additives are identified on the ingredient label
of foods..

14. Functions of Direct Food Additives
 "Direct" food additives are often added during processing
to: Add nutrients Help process or prepare the food Keep
the product fresh Make the food more appealing.
 Direct food additives may be man-made or natural.
 Natural food additives include:
 Herbs or spices to add flavor to foods.
 Vinegar for pickling foods Salt,
 to preserve meats

15. Food Additives: Types
(II) Indirect or unintentional Food Additives: Indirect food
additives are those that become part of the food in trace
amounts due to its packaging, storage or other handling.
 For instance, minute amounts of packaging substances
may find their way into foods during storage.
 Antioxidants, for example, used in edible oil may be found
in chips or any food item prepared with this oil. This is
known as the "carry over" principle.

16. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
 "Indirect" food additives are substances that may be found
in food during or after it is processed.
 They were not used in the food on purpose.
 These additives are present in small amounts in the final
product.
 Alternative Names Additives in food; Artificial flavors and
color Function

17. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
 Food additives serve 5 main functions.
 They are: 1. Give the food a smooth and consistent
texture:
Emulsifiers prevent liquid products from
separating.
Stabilizers and thickeners provide an even texture.
Anticaking agents allow substances to flow freely.

18. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
2. Improve or preserve the nutrient value: Many foods and
drinks are fortified and enriched to provide vitamins, minerals, and
other nutrients.
 Examples of commonly fortified foods are flour, cereal, margarine,
and milk.
 This helps make up for vitamins or minerals that may be low or
lacking in a person's diet.
 All products that contain added nutrients must be labeled.

19. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
3. Maintain the wholesomeness of foods: Bacteria and
other germs can cause foodborne illnesses.
 Preservatives reduce the spoilage that these germs can cause.
 Certain preservatives help preserve the flavor in baked goods
by preventing the fats and oils from going bad.
 Preservatives also keep fresh fruits from turning brown
when they are exposed to the air.

20. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
4. Control the acid-base balance of foods and provide
leavening: Certain additives help change the acid-base
balance of foods to get a certain flavor or color.
Leavening agents that release acids when they are
heated react with baking soda to help biscuits, cakes,
and other baked goods rise.

21. Functions of Indirect Food Additives
5. Provide color and enhance flavor: Certain
colors improve the appearance of foods.
Many spices, as well as natural and man-made
flavors, bring out the taste of food.

22. Beneficial Functions
 Food additives serve useful functions in the interest of
processor or manufacturer and consumer of the food.
 The major functions of food additives can be delineated as
below:
(1) To enhance the shelf life of food.
(2) To enhance the consumers acceptability of the food.
(3) To reduce wastage and improve yield of the product.

23. Beneficial Functions
(4) To facilitate preparation of food.
(5) To improve color and appearance of food.
(6) To improve body and texture of food.
(7) To improve flavor (aroma and taste) of food.
(8) To improve and maintain the nutritive
value of food

24. Food Additives: Summary
• Food ingredients have been used for many years to
preserve, flavor, blend, thicken and color foods, and have
played an important role in reducing serious nutritional
deficiencies among consumers.
• These ingredients also help ensure the availability of
flavorful, nutritious, safe, convenient, colorful and
affordable foods that meet consumer expectations year-
round.

25. Food Additives: Summary
• Food and color additives are strictly studied, regulated and
monitored.
• Federal regulations require evidence that each substance is safe
at its intended level of use before it may be added to foods.
• Furthermore, all additives are subject to ongoing safety review
as scientific understanding and methods of testing continue to
improve.
• Consumers should feel safe about the foods they eat.