Higher plants, represented by ca. 400 000 species worldwide, are valuable sources of diverse metabolites, many of which are used as food additives, flavours, colorants, agrochemicals, bio pesticides and pharmaceuticals. Moreover, in recent years, there has been a growing preference for the use of natural rather than synthetic products, expanding the market for natural plant products; this trend is expected to continue. However, the production of plant-derived substances is limited by environmental, ecological, climatic and (sometimes) political conditions. Thus, there are likely to be shortages of some products due to the combined pressures of increasing demand and limitations of supply. These problems could be overcome using plant in vitro technologies, which allow environment friendly production of natural food additives. The main problem hindering the implementation of these technologies in Bulgaria is shortage of regulatory mechanisms for using secondary metabolites from plant in vitro systems as food ingredients. In the presented scientific standpoint the potential of plant in vitro systems as technological matrixes for production of food ingredients is discussed. As particular example the potential of betalains produced by plant in vitro system is presented.

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