Food enzymes
enzymes, food enzymes, rennet, pepsin, amylase, lactase, lipase, proteases, enzimas
What it is
Proteins used to speed up specific reactions during food manufacturing. Many are used as processing aids and may be removed, inactivated or remain only as residues in the finished food.
Why BOTIA flags it
Food enzymes do their work during manufacturing and are often destroyed, inactivated or remain only as residues — which is why many do not appear on the ingredient list. Rennet in cheese is the best-known example: it can come from the stomach of a calf, from microorganisms, or be produced by fermentation with genetically modified microorganisms, and the label rarely makes that clear. When enzymes are declared, the name often does not reveal their source.
BOTIA CAN
- Detect rennet, enzymes and specific enzyme names when they are actually declared on the ingredient list.
- Explain that declared enzymes may have animal, microbial, plant or fermentation-derived sources and activate the Animal and Muslim traceability layers when the source matters.
BOTIA CANNOT
- Detect an enzyme used as a processing aid when it does not appear anywhere on the product label.
- Determine the exact source of a declared enzyme when the manufacturer gives only the enzyme name and no source information.