Natural pigments are edible pigments obtained from natural resources. Pigment extracted mainly from animal and plant tissues and microorganisms (culture), in which the plant sex colorant is the majority. Natural pigments not only have the function of coloring food, but also, some natural pigments have physiological activity.
Natural pigments derived from the roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits and animals and microorganisms of natural plants, edible pigments called edible natural pigments, from the addition of the amount of food pigments in the proportion of foods is very small, generally products, beverages, wine, cakes, sweets, medicine and so on the thousand points, extremely few even 100,000 per cent. Although natural pigments are widely permitted as edible pigments, the definition and licensing of natural edible pigments are not the same in countries, and some substances have been identified as spices rather than pigments, so many spices are not identified as pigments. In Sweden, for example, the country determined that turmeric, chili, saffron and sandalwood are not pigments, but spices. Other food regulations in countries such as Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Norway have similar provisions.
The development and application of natural pigments (naturalpigments) has become a topic of common concern for all industry and technology workers. People try to obtain natural pigments from various animal and plant resources and explore their physiological activities to alleviate and solve various problems caused by synthetic pigments. But because the color of natural pigment is unstable, in the process of its use is susceptible to various factors (such as light, temperature, oxidation, ph value, polarity of the medium, metal ions, additives, etc.), the effects of fading, discoloration and other aspects of the change, but affect its coloring effect, seriously restricting the natural pigment instead of synthetic pigment process.
