Active food packaging prepared with chitosan and olive pomace

•The addition of 10% olive powder microparticles improved the tensile strength of films.•The addition of olive wastes increased the antioxidant activity.•The films exhibited antioxidant effects against walnuts oxidation during 31 days.

There is currently a strong trend towards the use of biodegradable packaging to replace synthetic. Therefore the objective of this work was to evaluate the effect of the addition of different concentrations of flour and microparticles of olive pomace flour in chitosan based films. The films were evaluated for their barrier, mechanical, optical and antioxidant properties. The protective effect of films against nut oxidation was also evaluated. The incorporation of the olive residue flour into the chitosan matrix caused changes in the morphology, making the film more heterogeneous and rough. The addition of 10% of olive microparticles significantly improved the tensile strength (22.40 ± 0.22 MPa) of films without altering their original properties. The flour and the microparticles of olive increased the antioxidant capacity of the films that was proportional to the concentration of flour or microparticles added to the film. The films with 30% of flour or microparticles were effective as protective packaging against the oxidation of nuts during 31 days. The packages developed in this study are viable considering the material used in its production, its biodegradability and the added antioxidants naturally obtained from waste.

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