India, Nov. 30 -- Dr Satyanarayana Kandukuri, Food Processing Practice Lead, Sathguru Management Consultants

Probiotics are defined as "live microorganisms which, when administered in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host". Live microorganisms may be present in many foods and supplements, but only characterised strains with a scientifically demonstrated effect on health should be called probiotics. The criteria for probiotics include documented health benefit, microbes being alive at the time of consumption, microbes at dosage/levels that provide benefit, microbes taxonomically defined to strain level, availability of genome sequence of microbes and safety for intended use. In the past few years, the probiotics market has...