The meteoric rise of the health and wellness trend, powering a $6.3tn (€5.5tn) market and representing 6.03% of global GDP (Global Wellness Institute), has led to the rapid growth of existing diets and emergence of many more.
We discover the diets currently fuelling sales of food and beverage products across the globe.
Low-carb diet
The low-carbohydrate diet has long been lauded as the secret to weight loss, making it wildly popular with consumers and fuelling sales of low-carb foods and beverages. These include high-protein foods such as meat, fish and eggs.
What’s more, the number of new product launches that carry low-carb claims has risen sharply in recent years, according to research from Mintel.
The most popular low-carb launches have been seen in categories traditionally associated with high-carbohydrate products such as pasta, baking ingredients and bread.
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Keto diet
The ketogenic diet (keto) has been liked to numerous health benefits including weight loss, improved autoimmune disease symptoms, boosted brain health and delayed early Alzheimer’s. And it’s because of these positive links that keto is one of the most popular diets globally, boosting sales of low-carb and high-fat foods and beverages, and gaining a global market value of $9.42bn, with that figure projected to reach $16.23bn by 2033 (Spherical Insights). Meat, fish , eggs, nuts, seeds and dairy products feature heavily in the keto diet.
Keto works by restricting carbohydrate intake to provoke the body into producing ketones – an alternative fuel source for the body that’s made when glucose is limited.
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Autoimmune Protocol diet (AIP)
The Autoimmune Protocol diet (AIP) is fast becoming one of the most influential in food and beverage.
The AIP diet has gained particular attention in recent years as it aims to identify foods and beverages that trigger symptoms of autoimmune diseases, such as lupus, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and rheumatoid arthritis, as autoimmune diseases themselves cannot be cured and so must be managed.
Foods removed at the beginning of the AIP diet include all dairy products (milk, butter, cheese, yoghurt), all grains (bread, rice, pasta, barley, oats), potatoes, chocolate, alcohol, eggs, seeds, beans, nuts, legumes, dried fruits, and certain herbs and spices.
Food permitted as part of the AIP diet include fresh meat and seafood, non-nightshade vegetables, healthy fats, fermented foods and beverages, and natural sweeteners.
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Low-histamine diet
Understanding of the low-histamine diet is relatively new, but it’s quickly gaining consumer interest.
“In the last few years I’ve seen a huge increase in people asking about the low-histamine diet,” says Chloe Hall, founder of The Calm Gut Dietitian.
Histamine is made in the body from the amino acid, histidine. In addition to this, certain bacteria in the gut can also produce histamine. Outside of the body, the main source of histamine, is food.
Histamine can become a problem if the body over-produces histamine and fails to adequately manage it by breaking it down.
The low-histamine diet focuses on consuming foods that are low in histamine such as fresh meat, eggs, wholegrain products including pasta and bread, and removing foods that are high in histamine such as processed meats, aged cheeses, legumes and citrus fruit.
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Low-cortisol diet
Fast gaining popularity and influencing consumer eating habits, the low-cortisol diet is currently dominating social media, with ‘cortisol’ tagged 558K times on Instagram and 454k times on Facebook. What’s more, there a