For people who are actively health- and weight-conscious, yet have a sweet tooth, there’s always the dilemma of how to balance a desire for sweetness while managing sugars and calories in their diets. Currently, they can choose sugar, which is natural and tastes great, but impacts the daily calorie allowance. Or they can use sugar substitutes, which are low-calorie or calorie-free, but artificial.
A solution to this dilemma is now on the horizon. European regulatory approval is expected later this year, opening the way for the introduction of a completely new type of sweetener derived from the stevia plant.
In advance of this ruling, new market research has been conducted in the UK by The Silver Spoon Company in partnership with Cargill, the maker of Truvia sweetener, the first and leading brand of stevia-based sweeteners in the US.
The research suggests that in the UK, people are not completely satisfied with the artificial sweetener options currently available and that new stevia-based sweeteners are likely to be received positively when they become available in the UK later this year.
The research, released by Cargill and Silver Spoon to leading dieticians and nutritionists in London last week, identified two types of people for whom the new sweetener has particular appeal:
For the ‘Proactively Healthy’ group in particular, the current sweeteners on the market fail to meet their needs. Even though they predominantly choose and use sweeteners in their daily diet, they say they’re compromising their principles by having to use an artificial product in a bid to be healthy because there’s currently no plant-based alternative offering.
Health professionals, whose challenge is to motivate their patients to improve their diet and lifestyle, hope that consumers who don’t currently make sweetness decisions based on health may be prompted to reconsider once they become aware of this new plant-based category of calorie-free sweetener from the stevia leaf.
Professor Robert Murray of the Department of Human Nutrition at Ohio State University told the meeting: “Physicians and dieticians who work with families to improve nutrition and help establish a healthy weight need new tools. Diet behaviour is complex. We’re trying to achieve three goals: to cut added sugars and solid fats, to cut total calories and to promote the consumption of more nutrient rich foods. Truvia sweetener offers us a powerful tool to address all three in a family’s diet because it goes to the heart of dietary choice, the taste of food. I’m excited to introduce it to people seeking to improve their nutrition.”
Source: Associated British Foods, Cargill
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