UPDATE 2-Cargill rolling out natural, no-calorie sweetener
(Adds comment from Beverage Digest)
NEW YORK, July 9 (Reuters) - Agribusiness giant Cargill Inc [CARG.UL] is starting to roll out Truvia, its natural, no-calorie sweetener on Wednesday, and expects the product to be on grocery shelves across the U.S. sometime this fall.
Truvia is made from certain compounds in the leaves of stevia, a shrub native to Paraguay, and will provide a natural alternative to artificial sweeteners including Sweet 'N Low, Equal and Splenda.
Truvia is going on sale first at a handful of D'Agostino supermarkets in Manhattan, and will eventually be sold at grocery stores and big box retailers across the country, said Steve Snyder, vice president and business director of Cargill's Truvia business.
Snyder declined to name specific retailers, but said it will be "widely available" in stores and from a company website.
A box of 40 green and white packets of Truvia will have a suggested retail price of $3.99, which Snyder said is a little more expensive than older, artificial sweeteners, such as saccharin, aspartame and sucralose, which are sold under the respective brand names of Sweet'N Low, NutraSweet and Equal, and Splenda, which is made by Tate & Lyle Plc (TATE.L).
Sweet'N Low is manufactured by New York-based Cumberland Packing Corp while Chicago-based Merisant owns Equal. NutraSweet Co is owned by Boston-based private equity firm J.W. Childs Associates.
Truvia also will be used as a sweetener in beverages and foods -- such as yogurts, cereals and snack bars -- in early 2009, Snyder said.
Coca-Cola Co (KO.N) co-developed the product with Cargill and has exclusive rights to use Truvia in beverages. Rivals including PepsiCo Inc (PEP.N) and Dr Pepper Snapple Group Inc (DPS.N) are working on their own versions of natural, no-calorie sweeteners.
According to a May release from Cargill and Coke, Truvia, also known as rebiana, is "the first consistent, high-purity sweetener composed of rebaudioside A, the best-tasting part of the stevia leaf."
For the beverage industry, which has long searched for a natural diet sweetener, "rebiana is potentially a big deal, but I'd underscore 'potentially'," said John Sicher, publisher of industry newsletter Beverage Digest.
"If the beverage companies could replicate the taste of high-fructose corn syrup using stevia, it would be a huge deal. We'll have to see whether that happens," he said.
REGULATORY HURDLES
Stevia is approved as a food additive in a dozen countries including Japan, Brazil and China, but not in the European Union or the United States. Yet it is sold in the U.S. as a dietary supplement, since supplements are not subject to the same regulations.
Cargill is using various suppliers who are growing the plants in China and South America. One supplier, GLG Life Tech Corp (GLG.TO), said in May that it started building a 500-metric-ton stevia processing facility in Qindao, China. Continued...
