• The Israeli company PhenOlives produces flour from olive cake ("pomace") - a side stream of the olive oil production process.
Olive oil is big business, with over three million tonnes produced each year. However, the sector is extremely wasteful: to produce olive oil, only 15% of the fruit is used. The remaining semi-solid waste, known as cake, quickly oxidizes, becomes toxic and is mostly thrown away.
But according to the Israeli company PhenOlives, with the right technology, the remaining 85% can be recovered, recycling this waste and obtaining a new product. After patenting an advanced technology, PhenOlives transforms this side stream of olive oil production into meal for the food industry.
PhenOlives is the first company to develop a solution to stop the oxidation of waste olive oil, and this technology could revolutionize the olive oil industry.
A possible solution to the olive waste problem
At olive oil companies, trucks loaded with olives arrive regularly to drop off large loads of raw material for oil production. What many do not know is that loaded trucks also frequently leave the production area, but not all of them carry oil, but also residues, the by-stream of the olive oil production process.
Because residues oxidize quickly, they usually end up in landfills. Some can be stored near crops, but this is known to contaminate the soil. Also, the smell of rotting bread is hard to tolerate.
In an effort to make use of this waste while helping olive growers earn more for their efforts, PhenOlives developed this patented technology, able to prevent the oxidation of the olive cake. The start-up passes the cake through a series of machines that separate the by-product into the different components: pulp, juice and seeds.
The pulp is then dried and ground into a gluten-free flour, antioxidants can be extracted from the juice, and the kernels have the potential to be used by industries other than food and beverage. Thus, through this process, the result will be zero waste.
The potential of olive flour
For the start-up PhenOlives, the olive pulp, dried and ground to turn it into flour, is the focus. The flour obtained in this way does not have the standard white color of an alternative to refined wheat, but has a slightly brown color. But it has a lot of amazing properties that no other flour on the market today has, say company representatives.
Part of this is the antioxidants (such as tyrosol and hydroxytyrosol) from olive juice, and another part is the polyphenols (the ones that inspired the name PhenOlives) naturally present in olives.
Olive flour is also extremely high in fiber. While a regular white flour contains less than 3% fiber, PhenOlives olive flour contains 80%. It is also low in sugars, low in fat, low in calories and high in carbohydrates.
Nutritional benefits
Incidentally, PhenOlives is not the first company to recognize the potential health benefits of olives. Last year, Starbucks launched its brand Oiled, coffee specialty mixed with extra virgin olive oil.
PhenOlives targets the bakery sector. Being neutral in taste and gluten-free, olive flour has enormous potential, ranging from bread to pasta, cookies and crackers. Depending on the product, a different proportion of olive flour is introduced.
Biscuits, for example, can be made with 100% olive flour, while pasta will rather use 50%. Bread can be made with an addition of 20%, and cookies with 30%.
The dried pulp also has potential for other applications outside of baking, serving as a gluten-free stabilizer, for example, or as a fiber supplement in the nutraceutical sector. PhenOlives is also exploring opportunities in pet food.
Market launch prospects
Although olives have been consumed for millennia, PhenOlives' antioxidant process is completely new. Thus, in Israel, the country of origin of the start-up, olive flour required approval as a new food, and for the USA, PhenOlives technology is currently undergoing evaluation GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe).
For the EU, PhenOlives is not expected to need approval as a novel food, given that the flour is a derivative of olives. In addition, the process of obtaining olive flour is completely natural, no chemicals or additives are used. On the ingredient lists, the start-up expects the simple message of olive flour to be accepted.
From a price perspective, PhenOlives wants its flour to be competitive with other gluten-free flours on the market, and that's because it doesn't have to grow olives to produce the flour, but uses a secondary stream.
Supporting growers
In terms of its business model, PhenOlives partners with olive oil producers to secure the raw material, processing it in its own locations (located relatively close to the olive oil mills) and producing ingredients to sell B2B to them . In this way, PhenOlives expects oil producers to pay farmers more for their olives.
The cake will come almost exclusively from Europe, where the vast majority of olive oil is produced. Although Israel produces olive oil, it accounts for only 0,1% of world production. PhenOlives targets countries such as Spain, Greece, Italy and Portugal.
PhenOlives received €698.000 from the Israel Innovation Authority and, after the first round of funding, plans to expand the commercialization of its olive flour while developing new products.
Article written by Gabriela Dan, Editor of Arta Albă
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