Development Status and Trends of High-intensity Sweeteners in China

In recent decades, the high incidence of obesity, diabetes, and dental caries in the world, including China, has been considered to be closely related to dietary habits and dietary patterns, especially sucrose intake. At present, the development focus of China's sweet products is high-security sweeteners with no nutritional value, no calories, or extremely low calories. High-intensity sweeteners are characterized by their high safety, low dosage, high sweetness, and cost of use that are far lower than those of sucrose. These are also the motivation for food scientists to constantly develop new high-intensity sweeteners. So far, about 20 kinds of high-intensity sweeteners have been approved in various countries in the world. Among them, the varieties approved by most countries to use are mainly cyclamate, sucralose, AK sugar (acesulfame), aspartame, and argan. Litian, Neo-sweet, saccharine, glycyrrhizin, stevioside, mogroside, and somazan.

I. Functional high-intensity sweeteners Sweeteners are an important part of research in the food additives industry in the world today, especially non-caloric and non-nutritive high-intensity sweeteners. It is called a functional high-intensity sweetener. National governments have more stringent safety assessment procedures than other food chemicals. Therefore, there are not many new sweeteners that can meet the requirements of the food industry and are safely evaluated through rigorous toxicity and toxicological tests.

At present, functional sweeteners fall into two major categories, namely functional high-intensity sweeteners and functional bulk sweeteners. The sweetness of functional high-intensity sweeteners is usually more than 10 times that of sucrose. According to the source of different high-intensity sweeteners are divided into two categories of natural extracts and chemical synthesis products. Natural extracts currently include Stevia extract, Mangosteen extract, and Somacin, and chemical synthesis products include aspartame, neotame, sucralose, acesulfame, and alidan. The sweetness of the bulk sweetener is usually 0.2 to 2 times that of sucrose, which acts as both a sweetener and a filler, and can impart food structure and volume. Bulk sweeteners are classified into three major categories: functional monosaccharides, functional oligosaccharides, and polyalcohols. Functional monosaccharides mainly include crystalline fructose and L-sugar, and functional oligosaccharides include soybean oligosaccharides, fructo-oligosaccharides, isomaltose, and xylo-oligosaccharides, and polyalcohols include erythritol and wood. Sugar alcohols and Maltitol.

At present, China's approved synthetic high-intensity sweeteners include cyclamate, aspartame, acesulfame K, sucralose, alitame and neotame. The current artificial synthesis of high-intensity sweeteners can occupy a large market share mainly due to a number of advantages: For example, synthetic high-intensity sweeteners have high sweetness, small size, and small amount of use, and the energy value is 0 or almost zero, which is beneficial to the reduction of manufacturers. Cost, increase efficiency.

2. The safety of high-intensity sweeteners High-intensity sweeteners are a field of food additives researched by scientists of all countries in the world. The safety assessment procedures of government administrations in various countries are more stringent than other food chemicals, and therefore can pass through the United Nations. The rigorous toxicological and toxicological test safety evaluations of the authoritative organizations of the United States, the European Union, etc., as well as the sweetness requirements and the high degree of chemical synthetic sweeteners used in the food industry are not many. So far, the varieties that have been approved by most or many major developed countries in the world include sodium saccharin, cyclamate, sucralose, acesulfame, aspartame, neotame, and alidan. For example, sucralose is one of the synthetic raw materials using sucrose, which does not bring calories to the human body. Its flavor is close to that of sucrose. It does not cause human obesity and other diseases like sucrose. At present, sucralose has been used in over 3,000 kinds of foods in nearly 100 countries around the world. In addition, high-potency synthetic chemical sweeteners are absolutely harmless if they are legally and normally used, and they cannot mistakenly believe that "natural sweeteners are safer than chemical synthetic sweeteners." In China, whether it is used alone or in combination with high-power chemical sweeteners, as long as it is legally used in accordance with the scope and amount of use in China GB2760-2007, there will be no safety problems.

We eat sweet foods almost every day. Is it safe to add artificial sweeteners to some foods? The consensus that has been widely accepted is that in China, as long as the sweeteners are properly used according to national standards, there will be no harm to health.

In order to ensure the safe use of sweeteners, both international and domestic standards have been rigorously established. JECFA, which has been established for more than 40 years, is the highest authority internationally for the evaluation of the safety of food additives. The committee’s experts are to conduct toxicity studies (including acute, sub-chronic, mutagenic, carcinogenic, reproductive toxicity, and chronic toxicity), metabolic pathways, and metabolic dynamics for all sweeteners, based on which ADI is proposed. Value (milligrams per kilogram per person per day). For the sake of safety, various factors such as race, gender, and age have been taken into consideration when formulating the ADI value. It can be said that there is no safety problem when the sweetener is normally taken in accordance with the ADI value.

China's "Hygienic Standards for the Use of Food Additives" (GB2760-2007) refers to international standards and clearly stipulates the types, scope, and maximum use of food additives that China is allowed to use. If cyclamate is a non-caloric sweetener with a high multiple and relatively low price, cyclamate has obvious advantages in reducing the cost of food applications. In many countries and regions, the food processing industry prefers the use of cyclamate. The share of sales in the high-intensity sweeteners market has also been leading. Sodium cyclamate is a food additive and sweetener approved by China's Ministry of Health, and specifies the scope of its use in food and its usage (GB2760-2007). The quality of cyclamate also has national standards (GB12488-2008). Therefore, as long as the manufacturer produces strictly according to the national quality standards, food processing manufacturers strictly use the scope of use and the amount of use specified in the GB2760-2007 standard, can ensure that its use is safe, and consumers will not have any safety problems in normal feeding. Aspartame is composed of two protein components: aspartic acid and phenylalanine, which are present in all protein-containing foods that we eat daily. It is metabolized by the body's normal metabolic pathways. At present, there are more than 100 countries in the world that have approved the use of aspartame, and China’s health department approved the use of aspartame in 1986. Currently, it is widely used in foods other than canned foods. It is the only sweetener in all sweeteners that is not specified for production use. According to a large number of studies, aspartame is not only suitable for children (it does not cause dental caries), but it is also safe for pregnant women to use it rationally. It is worth noting that aspartame contains phenylalanine, so it is inappropriate to use phenylketonuria in patients with metabolic disorders of phenylalanine.

In short, the sweetener itself is not harmful or harmless, nor can it be said that natural sweeteners are safer than synthetic sweeteners. The key is rational use. Whether alone or in combination with high-intensity sweeteners, the scope of use and the amount of use in the Chinese health regulations should be strictly observed, so that using high-intensity sweeteners is certainly safe.

Third, the development of quality standards for high-intensity sweeteners in China In the past few years, China's food sweeteners need to apply for replacement of the production license monomer, that is, national and industry standards of sweetener products, as shown in the following table.

Table 2 National and Industry Standards for China's High-intensity Sweeteners

The original quality specification of cyclamate is GB 12488-1995 "Sodium cyclohexyl sulfamate food additive", which was approved in accordance with the National Standard of the People's Republic of China (No. 12 of 2008 (General 125), 2009 1 On the 1st of the month (revised in 2008-06-25), GB 12488-2008 "food additive ring sodium sulfamate (sodium cyclamate)" has replaced GB 12488-1995 and has implemented a new quality standard.

According to China's newly promulgated "Food Safety Law," all quality standards for food additives will be uniformly formulated as national standards for food safety, and high-intensity sweetener products that are being manufactured, revised, or will be included in the national standards or revised plans include: The following species: sucralose, AK sugar, glycyrrhizin, mogroside, saccharin (revised), stevioside (revised), etc. Sucralose, AK sugar, saccharin (revised) National food safety standards (repair) will be completed soon. The review and focal point for food safety standards in these countries will be the newly established food safety national standards review committee food additives subcommittee.

Fourth, the development status and trends of high-intensity sweeteners in China With the development of the world food industry and health food industry, the development of new functional high-intensity sweeteners is an important development direction in the 21st century. At present, a new generation of high-security sweeteners with better performance and better performance has been developed rapidly, and the market application is increasing. Such as aspartame, stevioside and so on. In addition to better applications, high-intensity sweeteners currently in the development stage include sweet protein, African bamboo shoots, sugar alcohol reprocessed sweeteners, and super sweetener basil. The requirements for developing new high-intensity sweeteners include: (1) higher sweetness; (2) higher safety; (3) more stable properties; (4) simpler production methods and lower costs. In recent years, China has successively approved the use of some high-intensity sweeteners. Due to its advantages of high sweetness, low dosage, and low cost, the use and production of high-intensity sweeteners are increasing.

At the same time, with the progress of society, the development of science and technology and the improvement of living standards, people are paying more and more attention to diet and health. Safe, non-caloric, high-intensity sweeteners with a flavor close to sucrose are the hope of today's consumers and one of the ways for food companies to produce higher-quality foods and gain profits. In recent years, the incidence of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and dental caries in China has been related to dietary habits and dietary patterns. For a long time, sucrose has been the main source of sweet foods for humans. As a high-calorie, relatively low-sweet food ingredient, long-term and large-scale consumption will lead to diseases such as obesity, hyperlipidemia, diabetes, and dental caries. The application of safe, healthy, low calorie, high sweetness and functional non-nutritive sweeteners to meet the health and scientific dietary needs is particularly urgent. Therefore, one of the highlights of the development of sweet products in China is the high safety, non-nutritional, and calorie-free high-intensity sweeteners. High-intensity sweetener products are characterized by high sweetness, low dosage, and very little safety, and the cost per unit of sweetness is much lower than that of traditional sweet products such as sucrose, which is also driving global development and application. The main driving force for functional high-intensity sweeteners.

Over the years, China's high-power chemical synthesis sweetener industry has made great contributions to China's export earnings, economic development, and increased employment. China is one of the countries that produce high-power chemical sweeteners. The output and sales of many products are among the highest in the world. However, domestic consumption accounts for only about 15-20%, and about 80-85% of exports are exported. At present, China is still a diversified consumer market for sweeteners. It focuses on sugar consumption, but compared with the world sweetener consumer market, domestic residents have significantly lower consumption levels of chemically synthesized sweeteners than the world average. In fact, even in the supermarket market in developed coastal cities in China, the proportion of foods that use high-power chemical sweeteners or high-intensity sweeteners in all sweet-tasting products is still significantly lower than in some developed countries. Compared with the consumption ratio of high-powered synthetic chemical sweeteners in the developed countries and territories of the United States, Japan, and the European Union, the current total consumption of chemical synthetic sweetener products is too low for the 1.3 billion Chinese residents. Absolutely not more.

The first important concept of the scientific development concept is development. China's high-power chemical synthesis sweetener industry must continue scientific development, and continuously satisfy global consumers, including Chinese consumers, and global food companies, including Chinese food companies, to high-intensity sweeteners. The ever-increasing need to better serve our country and the world's food industry and promote China's economic and social development.

However, some people in the country believe that China’s production and consumption of high-powered synthetic chemical sweeteners are excessive, management is not standardized, and there are security risks. It is necessary to limit development, and it is hoped that the management methods for saccharin will be applied to cyclamate, Acesulfame, Ah. Sparaffin and sucralose and other high-intensity synthetic sweetener products, to develop directive or guiding plans to control the total production and sales of these high-powered chemical synthetic sweeteners, penalize over production and marketing plans, and that this will have high sweetness The "blind expansion" of the pharmaceutical industry has an inhibitory effect. It is hoped that the main purpose of limiting the development of the high-power chemical sweetener industry through this method is to give the sugar industry "more market and development space." This is certainly not the practice of the socialist market economy. It is also contrary to the current scientific development concept advocated by China. From the long-term perspective and the whole (including the sugar industry), it will bring a lot of drawbacks, and these drawbacks are actually the result of the planned economy. Disadvantages. The high-power chemical synthesis sweetener industry is subject to strict restrictions. Even after restrictions by certain industries or individuals, not only does the high-power chemical synthesis sweetener industry no longer have the possibility of continuing scientific development, and on the surface it provides space for the development of the sugar industry. In fact, from a long-term and global perspective, it will certainly inhibit the development of the sugar industry, which is extremely unfavorable to the overall and long-term development of this industry. The development of the sucrose industry should start from improving its own industrial connotation, give play to its own industrial advantages, compete with the international sucrose industry, and increase the market share of domestic sucrose products in China is a wise and long-term plan. Take the development of saccharin as an example. Since saccharin implements a mandatory plan management method and lacks market competition, there are many drawbacks. I will not discuss it here. I will simply say two things. There are obvious drawbacks in the scientific and technological innovation of the saccharin industry, and it also affects the environmental protection and consumer interests. For example, the quality standards of saccharine have not been revised for more than 20 years, and the National Standards Committee has “proactively” suppressed or even stagnated in many aspects such as improvement of product quality, sewage treatment technology, and application innovation of saccharin. After the standard project was issued, even at that time, there was no saccharine production company willing to participate in the drafting and revision work for a long time. This situation and other high-powered chemical synthesis sweetener companies actively participated in the exhibition and provided product technical indicators to compete with each other. The situation is clearly contrasted. In addition, due to mandatory production quotas, the quota index will often be out of line with market demand, making the domestic saccharin market still have a relatively chaotic situation. The proportion of saccharin produced by underground production methods by some illegal production enterprises in the market is not low. This has brought about many problems such as supervision, product quality, and food safety, and it has always hurt the interests of our country and consumers.

A health officials in New York City recently wrote an article calling for heavy taxes on sugar-containing carbonated drinks and sports drinks to promote the U.S. people to reduce consumption of such beverages in order to control obesity. New York City Health Affairs Officer Dr. Thomas and others in the New England Journal of Medicine said that according to estimates, a special tax of 1 cent per ounce on sugary drinks would reduce the public’s consumption of sugary drinks. One-tenth, while making the entire New York State increase annual revenue of 1.2 billion US dollars. After the publication of this article, it attracted the attention of the world, and its views gained many support. According to reports, there are several states in the United States that are planning to add similar taxes.

Although sucrose is blamed on the global scale as an important cause of excess energy and dental caries in the human body, although the proportion of relative intake and intake of consumers in many developed countries abroad is decreasing, we cannot deny that it is in our country's food. Industry still plays an important role. In addition, due to the different geographical conditions in different countries and the different social development status, the trend of developing sweeteners is based on the specific conditions of each country. The United States, Japan, and other countries do not produce sucrose or produce very little. For example, Japan adopts a variety of development guidelines to apply high-powered synthetic chemical sweeteners or to extract and refine high-intensity sweeteners from imported raw materials. China's sugar production ranks among the top in the world. If we continue to grow, we must expand the area of cultivated land and compete with grain and oil for land. However, China has a large population and the area of per capita arable land is becoming less and less. One of the key development priorities in the future is the high-power chemical synthesis of sweeteners. With the development of the world food industry and the health food industry, the development of new high-power chemical sweeteners must also be an important development direction of the global sweet product industry in the 21st century.