Valorization of Fruit Co-Product Flours for Human Nutrition: Challenges, Applications, and Perspectives

Abstract

The fruit agro-industry is one of the sectors that stand out both in production and in the volume of losses along the supply chains, which has generated a strong concern from the nutritional, economic, social, and environmental points of view. This study is aimed at understanding the updated scenario of the conversion of fruit residues into value-added co-products, its main challenges, applications, and perspectives. For this, a literature review was conducted through Scielo, PubMed, Google Scholar, and ScienceDirect databases. The advanced search covered the period from 2018 to 2022. The evaluation of the articles showed that the drying process is an important step to obtain flours from fruit co-products with characteristics that can provide longer shelf life, practicality, and versatility of use, demonstrating great potential for inclusion in various food preparations; although difficulties persist around the technological characteristics of this raw material, they can confer a nutritional increase, in addition to the possibility of additional health benefits due to the presence of bioactive compounds and fibers inherent in these products. Indeed, although there is a long way to go in studies with co-products derived from residual fractions of fruits, strategies such as these contribute to the better management of losses along the agri-food chains while providing greater food and nutrition security for the global population on the path to sustainability.