Food processing means converting the agricultural product into food, plus changing one form of food into another. The thought of processed food ignites different feelings in different people. Some are absolute fans, while some others are not that into it.
Food processing is a vast industry and involves a lot of work. There are different types of machinery for different types of food. The food processing is done for raw food and sometimes even for ready food. Getting processed food is like a boon for a lot of people, especially those who don’t get time to venture into cooking and the ones who don’t know how to cook.
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The thought that those are the only two sections of the target audience for the food processing industry is incorrect. It provides processed raw food, too, which is used for cooking everywhere. Let us take a look at the details.
Types Of Food Processing
As mentioned above, the food processing industry is vast, and it includes various foods. If it has to come to division, however, it can be classified into three major sections as below
Primary Food Processing
Primary food processing, as the name suggests, processes primary food. The primary food includes agricultural products and livestock. This category comprises commodities that are produced by old processes such as threshing, drying, milling, and winnowing of grains, butchering the animals to get meat. It also includes candling eggs, filtering oils and smoking meat and fish. This is termed as primary because it is using raw products.
Secondary Food Processing
When you make bread out of flour, that is secondary food processing. You used an already processed food ingredient to make ready to eat food. So this process of using food to produce food is secondary food processing.
Whether the bread gets made at a large factory, small bakery, or at your home, it is all still secondary food processing. Sausages are also an excellent example of this type of food processing because they are further made out of the meat that has been already processed.
Tertiary Food Processing
The making and processing of the ready to eat food come under tertiary food processing. These are also commonly termed as packaged food. This food doesn’t need much preparation and can be easily consumed without cooking efforts. It is targeted at increasing consumption. The perfect examples are airline meals, a TV dinner and the likes of it. This food contains a significant number of preservatives to improve shelf life.
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Benefits Of Food Processing
Processing food to make it such that it is readily available is one of the peak uses of technology. People are inventing things to make human life more manageable. There are a lot of benefits that come out of the processing of food, let us discuss some
Convenient
This is a common and visible benefit. People who are looking for quick, instant food have a solution in the form of tertiary processed food. Early morning to work or late night from work, both seem sorted thanks to the packaged food. The Sunday binge is facilitated by processed food too. Earlier while the flour was made manually, today huge machines are doing it for us.
Source: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/gluten-free-diet
Saves Time
Be it by using superfast technology or by reducing the cooking time; food processing saves a lot of time. There are so many ways in which food processing saves time. Be it readymade bread, processed sausages, or ready to eat food; all these options are saving our time.
Toxin Removal
Food processing ensures that any dirty toxin is removed. While processing the food, any bad or damaged material is removed and filtered out. This reduces the chances of food poisoning. The harmful toxins in food can spoil the health and impact the body hugely, food processing filters out the toxins and help us with good food.
Preservatives
Processed food contains preservatives. This increases their shelf life. This also means that food wastage is reduced. Preservatives help the food to sustain longer. Even perishable products can be maintained comparatively for a more extended period.
Source: https://greatist.com/eat/beginners-guide-to-the-ketogenic-diet
Drawbacks Of Food Processing
While this technology has served us so much, not everything is good about it. There are concerns raised over the processed food. Let us take a look at some of these concerns.
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Decreases Nutrition
This is one of the major concerns. When food is processed, it’s nutritional value is reduced. How many nutrients are lost depends on the method of food processing? For example, heating food again kills vitamin C from it meaning canned fruits won’t benefit as much as fresh ones.
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Food Additives
Food additives are components added to the food to enhance its appearance or taste. These are not good for health. If the body is exposed to a lot of food additives, it starts showing adverse health symptoms, which is a significant concern with food processing. The main issue is the excess use of artificial additives.
Contamination Risks
When food is processed and proper care is not taken, it can lead to contamination of the food. This, in turn, causes an effect on people who consume it. Processing at the factory happens on a large scale. Contamination could be caused by a bad batch of food, old batch getting used, animal fluids, or other such stuff. This can be eliminated by way of proper care.
The grease and lubricants used in the valve and various machinery parts can be the major issue of contamination. To avoid these issues you need proper and efficiently smooth valves to control and regulate the flow of the products. Relying on a top valve factory will definitely help you to minimize the contamination risks.
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Conclusion
Everything in life has its pros and cons. The ideal way is to maximize the pros and minimize the cons Some things are made for our convenience and must only be used when necessary. Hopefully, this article sends the correct message about processed food.
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