2.4 Industrial Applications and ’Natural‘ certification as
driving force of bio-based approaches
Lately, there has been an increasing call for the sustainability in
industry, especially in food for daily consumption and healthy food. The
global market for the flavor and fragrance industry has tripled since
the beginning of the 21st century. According to a new
market research study, this industry will grow at a CAGR (Compound
Annual Growth Rate) of approximately 3.1% over the next five years,
reaching US$ 30.5 billion in 2024 (US$ 25.5 billion in 2019). In
addition to the CAGR of 3.1%, the natural and organic flavors sector is
growing much faster, with an average annual growth rate of 5.7% to
US$ 11 billion in 2026 from US$ 6.8 billion in 2019 [35]. This
growth is mainly derived due to the global pressure for the use of
flavors in food production, triggered by customer’s demand as well as
the increasing cost efficiency through technological progress and the
concomitant possibility to declare products as natural.
The European regulation on flavors (EEC No 1334/2008) defines in article
3 (2) c): “Natural flavoring substance shall mean a flavoring
substance obtained by appropriate physical, enzymatic or microbiological
processes from material of vegetable, animal or microbiological origin
either in the raw state or after processing for human consumption by one
or more of the traditional food preparation processes”.
To the best of our knowledge, no biotechnological syntheses for
industrial production of alkylated pyrazine derivatives, with the
declaration natural, have currently been registered. Thus, extraction
from natural sources is the only access to natural pyrazines to this
end.