ISRAEL – Israel-based sugar reduction ingredient company DouxMatok has unveiled a manufacturing partnership with Lantic, owned by Rogers Sugar, Canada’s largest refiner of the sweetener.
The partnership will enable DouxMatok’s signature ingredient, which allows the amount of sugar in products to be reduced about 40%, to be produced in large scale and made available to U.S. food companies in 2021.
Lantic has a large reach in Canada, with refineries in Montreal and Vancouver, British Columbia, as well a factory in Alberta that can produce up to 165 tons of sugar annually from locally grown sugar beets.
DouxMatok will thus be able to leverage on tis manufacturing partnership are to make its ingredient available to the masses.
DouxMatok and Lantic have been working together for two years, transitioning from pilot testing to commercial-scale manufacturing of the ingredient.
The companies also have been working with food companies in North America to develop new products and reformulate existing ones to use less sugar.
DouxMatok CEO Eran Baniel in an interview earlier this year said that prototypes of products with DouxMatok have been developed for the North American market — and have done exceptionally well in consumer tests.
As consumers look for ways to eat less sugar — and Nutrition Facts labels now broadcasting exactly how much of the sweetener is added to products — DouxMatok’s ingredient has been anxiously awaited.
DouxMatok is however, not the only sugar replacement that’s being produced on an industrial scale.
Manufacturers have been looking to natural ingredients — including stevia, monk fruit, erythritol and allulose — to sweeten products and improve the way ingredients look on their Nutrition Facts panels.
Some of these, including stevia and monk fruit, are much more intense than traditional sugar, meaning less is needed to deliver the same degree of flavor.
Erythritol has fewer calories than sugar, while allulose is metabolized differently and is not considered an added sugar for labeling purposes.
But every sweetener is different, and it’s unlikely right now that any one of them will own the market in quite the same way sugar does.
One thing is certain: Consumers say taste is the most important aspect of anything they eat.
Other natural sweeteners are prone to off tastes, but DouxMatok is actually sugar, which should give it an advantage on its competitors.
Now the question is when this ingredient will start getting into products and onto shelves or in menus.
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