In today’s society, consumers are choosing the food they eat with a more critical eye, requesting further information about a products’ ingredients and the additives they contain. Our perception of natural, when it comes to food, is more often than not determined by the colour. The brighter it is the less natural it is, we believe. If you want to produce products with bright, vibrant colours as well as meet the demands of consumers, this can be a difficult challenge. And with the new food labelling legislation this has also become increasingly complicated.
Colourants have always been a hot topic in the food industry, and once the Southampton study (food safety study conducted in 2008 testing the effect of food colours on children’s behaviour) was published, it has become even more of a burning issue. The term ‘natural’, when applied to any food stuff, is always questioned, and agreements concerning the use of this term are yet to be decided upon. This has lead to manufacturers taking radical steps to remove artificial colourants and improve the image and composition of their products.
In SA our recently published food labelling legislation, particularly the section on colours will change the way we look colouring foodstuffs in the near future. It has become impossible to label colourants on your product unless they are listed on the approved colourant list in the legislation, you may not even label natural colours unless specified by the legislation.
At present the term ‘natural’ is interpreted in many different ways and in the absence of any formal legal definition it is not easy for manufacturers and consumers to determine exactly what can or cannot be promoted under a natural claim. Most agree that, if ‘natural’, colours should be considered food ingredients rather than additives and labelled as such. It has been found that fruit and vegetable concentrates, which impart colours, have a unique spot in the market. These ingredients do not contain E-numbers giving them immediate advantage with the ‘natural’ trend.
The question remains, however – how will these colouring foodstuffs fit into the new labelling legislation, but stay on top of the natural food trend? Clean labels only showing an ingredient list, in which these colouring foodstuffs would fall, would give these products a certain edge over those containing colourants as additives.
A new product called Exberry from GNT, could be the solution. Confectionary, cakes, dairy products and beverages can have those bright and vibrant colours consumers are used to, naturally. Exberry concentrates are produced from fruits, vegetables and edible plants, and processed mechanically with water giving it high-quality stability. They are free from artificial additives and Exberry is E-number free, making it a natural food ingredient possible to be included on clean labels.
Labelling legislation and colourants
As recently highlighted at a SAAFoST Northern Branch speaker evening, the regulations on food colours in South Africa are both stringent and different to those in the EU. Materials used in food which have a primary purpose of imparting colour to food must be described as colours, even if they are from ‘natural’ sources. It falls under the colouring regulations and must be in the list of permitted colours set out in the regulations.
For more information contact Nicolett Elrick at Carst and Walker
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or Tel: + 27 11 489 3600
Carst and Walker website
