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- Healthy lifestyle by the throat: Russians are being sold "chemistry" under the guise of healthy superfoods
Healthy lifestyle by the throat: Russians are being sold "chemistry" under the guise of healthy superfoods
In Russia, sugar substitutes and "diet" desserts based on them are produced by bakeries and chemical industry enterprises, Izvestia found out in the course of its own investigation. Synthetic substitutes are mixed and passed off as a super useful product. And in production they continue to use stevia, which was banned in Russia in 2024. At the same time, sales of healthy products in retail chains grew by an average of 15-20% over the year, analysts said. Such "sweets" bring business millions, but can seriously affect the health of consumers, according to doctors. Izvestia looked into the dangers of "healthy desserts" and how to distinguish them from safe ones.
Where sugar substitutes are produced
Over the past year, sales of healthy products in retail chains have increased by 15-20% on average, reported "Izvestia" in the Association of Retail Trade Companies (ACORT). On the wave of the general craze for superfoods, one of the most comprehensive trends was the rejection of refined sugar. Therefore, in 2024, some chains have recorded an increase in sales of healthy foods up to 40%.
Almost all known world varieties of sugar substitutes are represented in Russia: erythritol, saccharinates, cyclamates, aspartame, sucralose, fructose, isomalt, maltitol, xylitol and others. Forms are liquid, tablets, and powder. They are added to protein cookies and bars, eco-friendly marmalade and syrups with a fat-burning effect. Such products can now be found in any supermarket.
"Izvestia" under the guise of dessert manufacturers visited several such production facilities and suppliers. It turned out that sweeteners are sold literally tons and it is not difficult to buy them online. Vidadi Abbasov, a businessman from Nizhny Novgorod, told us that most of the sweeteners are imported from China and make millions on this.
Vidadi leads us around the industrial hangar he rents and shows us bags of white powder.
- Our manufacturer is the largest company in China, and this is our development, we mix it according to our own recipe and use it," the supplier said proudly.
The merchant calls the mixture of four sweeteners "development". He sells it on marketplaces - in sections where "proper nutrition" is presented. Each component by itself has an unpleasant flavor, but in combination they block each other and the resulting flavor is closer to sugar, he claims.
For the production of lemonade, the supplier recommends using aspartame (included in the list of carcinogens - "Izvestia"). When it comes to product documents, Vidadi quickly says goodbye.
Sweetener instead of bread and powder
Another successful production of additives replacing sugar, "Izvestia" found at a household chemical company in the Krasnodar region.
Denis, a representative of the plant, presents us a mix based on stevia, erythritol (aka melon sugar) and sucralose. According to the man, the demand for stevia is constantly increasing: in his hangar the powder stands in pallets almost up to the ceiling. The sweetener stevia is one of the lowest-calorie sweeteners, but the Eurasian Economic Commission banned it back in February 2024, along with 18 other dangerous food additives.
Issues related to the use of sugar substitutes (sweeteners) are regulated by the technical regulations of the Customs Union.
The sweeteners authorized for use in the production of food products currently include: sorbitol (E420), mannitol (E421), acesulfame potassium (E950), aspartame (E951), cyclamic acid and its sodium and calcium salts (E952), isomalt (E953), saccharin (E954), sucralose (E955), thaumatin (E957), neohesperidin dihydrochalcone (E959), steviol glycosides (E960), neotame (E961), aspartame-acesulfame salt (E962), maltitol and maltitol syrup (E965), lactitol (E966), xylitol (E967), erythritol (E968). The regulation allows retail sale of all listed sweeteners except neotame (E961).
Until February 27, 2024, this list also included stevia leaves. However, since the leaves are not strictly speaking a food additive but a "separate food component", they were removed from the list, leaving steviol glycosides.
Since the launch of production of sweeteners, the business of LLC "Floreal" went uphill - according to data from public sources, in five years the income increased from 120 million to 300 million rubles. A kilogram of sweetener is offered here for 2.6 thousand rubles, but in bulk it will be "much cheaper" - we were given the sweetener to try in a package labeled "production of detergents and disinfectants". According to the SPARK database, the turnover of some companies selling "fitness desserts" today reaches several billion rubles.
The conveyor belt of the oldest bakery in the Vladimir region is now producing not loaves, but protein bars - the company switched to this product more than 15 years ago. Such sweets are produced here 5 million pieces a month, instead of sugar added maltitet. They are sold in hypermarkets and on marketplaces. The plant's turnover for 2023 is 600 million rubles, and contract production is being launched in parallel.
The marketing strategy is based on the idea of the benefits of substitutes. At the same time, the plant's general director Yuri Shatalov, in a conversation with Izvestia, called the benefits of most superfoods a legend that allows them to make a profit. In his opinion, 90% of the products sold as useful are "pseudo-SSF".
Another dealer, whom we found through an ad on the Internet, told us that the company she represents has a production facility in Serpukhov near Moscow. There the additives can be packed in the required volume - even 30 or 100 kilograms. It costs 3.7 thousand per kilogram if you take it in bulk.
- We have regular customers, no one has ever complained," says the woman.
In fact, anyone can produce healthy desserts today. A private certification center in Yekaterinburg agreed to issue us, as a manufacturer of healthy sweets, the necessary documents for the supervisory authorities in two days. The price of the issue - from 10.5 to 21 thousand rubles, depending on whether the laboratory is accredited. In this case, tests in the laboratory will not be conducted in fact, although the document will indicate the opposite, said the manager of the center Guzel. The validity of the certificate "No sugar" - from one to five years.
- For our part, we recommend to issue a protocol from accredited laboratories, as during inspections of Rospotrebnadzor or FAS on them there are fewer questions, supervisory authorities trust this scheme of registration, - advised the employee of the center.
Speculation on the benefits
Recently, there has been a huge number of manufacturers who speculate on some natural food products that supposedly have a special benefit, said "Izvestia" head of the laboratory of food chemistry of the Federal Research Center for Nutrition and Biotechnology, Doctor of Biological Sciences Vladimir Bessonov.
- This speculation allows you to get into a person's pocket," says the expert. - A person starts looking for something that says "natural" or "useful". At the same time, there is nothing useful in such desserts. Sweeteners do not make the product dietary, they simply change its chemical composition.
Changing sugar for substitutes is "a strange intermediate position", believes Vladimir Bessonov.
- If you give up sugar, you can also give up sweeteners," he believes. - In any case, I would not buy such substitutes somewhere in a garage, even if it is cheaper.
Uncontrolled use of any substance will lead to a negative effect, and this also applies to sweeteners, says Lyudmila Yakimova, Associate Professor of the Department of Organic Medical Chemistry at Kazan Federal University, Candidate of Chemical Sciences.
- Sugar substitutes are of natural origin (for example, from stevia) and synthetic - cyclamates, aspartame, acesulfame and sucralose," the expert told Izvestia. - If there is an alternative, I would choose natural ones.
According to Lyudmila Yakimova, the danger of sugar substitutes is that they cause hunger and increase appetite, which can be attributed to the side effects of such additives. In addition, succumbing to marketing tricks and replacing sugar with sugar substitutes, people believe that they have already removed part of the carbohydrates and as a result allow themselves to consume more calories. Such a trap instead of weight loss sometimes leads, on the contrary, to obesity, the expert pointed out.
It is not necessary to exceed the recommended safe doses of sweeteners and sweeteners, confirmed "Izvestia" in Rospotrebnadzor.
- In recent decades, new forms of sweetening substances have been actively synthesized. In terms of sweetness and taste they are much ahead of the first generation sweeteners synthesized in the beginning and middle of the last century (cyclamates and saccharine). The latter are inferior to the new generation sweeteners (sucralose, acesulfame potassium) both in terms of organoleptic characteristics and the number of side effects, - noted in the department.
The period of accumulation of evidence base on the safety of new-generation sweeteners has not yet been completed, they noted. Therefore, it is desirable to use them occasionally, as part of a diet with a reduced content of simple carbohydrates.
- Daily, uncontrolled use of sweeteners increases the risk of developing and perpetuating an inadequate caloric estimate of simple carbohydrates, which often leads to overeating and the progression of obesity. Before you start using sweeteners in your diet - consult your doctor, - advised in Rospotrebnadzor.
Illusion of weight loss
Sweeteners were created specifically for diabetics, not for mass consumption, reminded "Izvestia" associate professor of the Department of Biotechnology and Technology of Bioorganic Synthesis Products, PhD Veronica Tarasova.
- The sweetener often affects the endocrine system, hormonal background and thyroid gland, - said the expert. - As a result, we stop digesting sugar and can get diabetes. There are sweeteners that contain hidden sugars, such as topinambour syrup. Hidden sugars are dangerous for diabetics and can cause a spike in the glycemic index.
A number of synthetic sweeteners can cause an allergic reaction if used systematically, the expert added.
It is possible to assess the harm or benefit of a particular sweetener only under laboratory conditions. You can do it yourself only by measuring blood sugar levels a certain time after consumption, the expert summarized.
Products that contain sweeteners must be labeled "with sweeteners" or "contains sweeteners," the Public Consumer Initiative (PCI) explained to Izvestia. They added that there are practically no administrative and court cases related to violations of the rules for the use and sale of sweeteners. This can be explained, among other things, by the relative softness of regulatory restrictions.
Since exceeding the norms for the use and consumption of sweeteners can cause tangible harm to health, it seems reasonable to strengthen control over the circulation of both sugar substitutes themselves and food products that contain them, said Oleg Pavlov, Chairman of the OPI.
- The sale of products that are not accompanied by warning information (including on consumption rates and the consequences of non-compliance), as well as those that have not passed the confirmation of compliance with mandatory requirements, should be strongly discouraged," the expert said. - The inclusion of sweeteners and products containing them in the area of state monitoring of the turnover of goods would be quite a logical decision.
Rosstat told Izvestia that sweeteners and products created on their basis are not monitored as a separate type of goods, so the volume of sales of these products at the end of the year is unknown. "Izvestia also sent a request to the Ministry of Industry and Trade about the share of "healthy sweets" in the total market volume and the number of products sold in 2024.
