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The Salt and Sugar Reduction Symposium 2008 took place on 31 March – 1 April in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The symposium, organised by CMPi, attracted around 120 delegates from 22 countries, who came to learn about the latest developments in food reformulation to reduce or replace sugar and salt.

Obesity is one of the greatest public health challenges of the 21st century, while cardiovascular disease remains the biggest cause of death in both the developed and developing world – killing around 12.7 million people each year.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) the prevalence of obesity has tripled in many European countries since the 1980s, and the number of those affected continues to rise at an alarming rate. Raised blood pressure, WHO reports, is the biggest single cause of cardiovascular disease and the current high intake of salt is the major determinant of this.

Danisco Sweeteners Dairy Application Manager Mette Sveje commented: “Consumers are more aware of their daily total sugar consumption than their daily fat consumption, and there is growing concern about the amounts and types of sugars consumed.”

However, while taste and wellbeing are increasingly important to the average consumer, taste remains key and the conference’s speakers detailed various methods facilitating the achievement of both, without compromise.

The last decade has seen the number of products launched in Europe with a ‘low’ or ‘reduced’ sugar position far exceed those labelled ‘all natural’, demonstrating growing consumer interests, and this trend can be expected to continue. But salt and sugar remain key elements of our diets, and delegates heard just how important communication with the consumer is to facilitate healthy purchases, and how messages must be conveyed in a way that the consumer will understand.