In response to increasing consumer demand and proposed government legislation for lower levels of sodium, sugar and fat in food and drink, Barilla has spoken out about their main challenges with reformulation.
“Our top challenge is to find appropriate technological solutions for salt, fat and sugar reduction that enable us to deliver the same product quality to the consumers” says Kristen Anderson, VP of food and tasting science, nutrition research, and regulatory within the research organization.
“For example, many of our bakery products rely on certain ingredients to give the correct texture in terms of crispiness and mouth feel, as well as ensuring the shelf life of the product without oxidation,” explains Anderson.
With global trends for healthier snacking, especially for children, the industry has been working on finding solutions to these challenges, but the journey has not been easy.
“I think we will find unique solutions to these challenges in the future. We in the food and beverage industry should view this road of reformulation to improve the profile of our products as a long term initiative.”
“We will not find all solutions in the short term and will need to continue to invest in new technologies.”
Anderson will be joining other F&B leaders in discussions around this topic at the Fi Reformulation Series, a series of events taking place in Amsterdam, the Netherlands on October 8-10, 2014, focussed on Sodium, Sugar and Fat reduction.
Following Nestlé’s pledge to further reduce salt levels across its food brands worldwide to meet a World Health Organisation target of a 5 g of salt per person per day by 2025, Henri-Pierre Lenoble, Nutrition, Health & Wellness Manager, Nestlé Food will join the Reformulation Series to explain their decision to meet this target and address the realities of further salt reduction, from cost implications to technical barriers and healthier consumer products and choices.
With Tesco asking all its suppliers to remove added sugar from children’s drinks, David Beardmore, the company’s category buying manager for soft drinks and juice, will discuss how they plan to work with manufacturers to implement this strategy and overcome the technical challenges that will be faced.
