Market analysis of potentially cardioprotective foods in context of legal health and nutrition claims
- 31.01.2018
- English Articles
- Florian Bratzke
- Falk Ritschel
- Richard Wache
- Katrin Thamm
- Julia Kühn
- Christine Dawczynski
- Claudia Wiacek
- Gabriele I. Stangl
- Peggy G. Braun
- Stefan Lorkowski, Toni Meier
Peer-reviewed | Manuscript received: May 05, 2017 | Revision accepted: September 04, 2017
Focus: meat, dairy and egg products
Introduction
Cardiovascular diseases are still much the most important causes of death in Germany. According to the 2015 mortality statistics, 356,600 deaths (39 %) were due to cardiovascular diseases [1]. According to the International Study on Disease Burden, 44 % of these were associated with nutrition [2]. Thus, healthier (cardiovascular) nutrition could have avoided about 157,000 premature deaths in 2015.
Causes, costs and prevention of cardiovascular diseases
There are many different causes of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and these may be subdivided into variable factors (e.g. nutrition, tobacco consumption, lack of exercise) and fixed factors (age, gender, genetic predisposition) [3]. Most CVD are related to the magnitude of variable risk factors. The main risk factors are imbalanced nutrition and high blood pressure [4].
Abstract
As there has been an increase in nutrition-associated cardiovascular diseases in Germany, the present article considers the extent to which the German retail food market was penetrated in 2016 by healthier meat, dairy and egg products. Furthermore, a market potential analysis was performed based on mean domestic expenditure for these foods in families with cardiovascular patients or hypertension. Market penetration by foods of healthier composition is relatively low, corresponding to 1.9 % for meat products and 1.6 % for dairy and egg products. This is in stark contrast to the potential market share of 2.5–38 %, with an annual sales volume of 1.5–15.4 billion €, depending on the assumptions or scenario – either a defensive scenario for cardiovascular patients or a more offensive scenario for hypertensives. Although the decisive factors in preventing cardiovascular disease are adherence to a healthy diet based on vegetables, fruit and fiber – as well as a healthy lifestyle –, reformulated foods can help patients to improve their nutrition. The following article shows that the market potential for such foods is far from exhausted.
Keywords: cardiovascular diseases, meat and sausage products, dairy and egg products, market analysis, nutriCARD
