The profile of bioactive substances in ten vegetable and fruit by-products from a food supply chain in Colombia

The processing and commercialization of fruits and vegetables produces considerable amounts of by-products, the disposal of which can be a problem for the industry, but can also provide a valuable source of bioactive compounds. The aim of this research was to evaluate the potential of different by-products generated in Central Mayorista de Antioquia to serve as a source of biocompounds for their possible use as functional ingredients for animal feed or human consumption. The ten by-products with the highest production per day were selected for analysis of the total carotenes, polyphenols and antioxidant capacity by ORAC. Acceptance Quality Limit (AQL) tables were used at the special inspection level S2, considering the amount of by-products produced (kg/day) as a lot to determine the sample size for analysis. To further characterize the carotene content, bell pepper, carrot, tomato, cabbage and lettuce with the highest carotene values (16.16, 10.36, 8.37, 7.36 and 4.41 mg β-carotene/100g, respectively), were selected to determine their specific carotene composition by HPLC with regard to β-carotene, lycopene and lutein. HPLC analysis showed the presence of β-carotene in all of the by-products analyzed: lycopene in tomato and lutein in cabbage, lettuce, tomato and carrot. Thus, the study showed that the biocompounds found in those five by-products suggest that they can be used as a raw material in the development of functional foods for human consumption and animal feed, offering an alternative way to add value to by-products in food supply chains.