SODIUM REDUCTION STILL ON THE RISE

JOINT ACTION FOR BETTER NUTRITION

Increased consumption of processed food, rapid urbanization, and changing lifestyles have shifted our dietary patterns into excessive salt/sodium intake.

Fortunately, governments and healthcare professionals have been working in tandem to increase awareness about the implications of excessive salt consumption. At the same time, consumers have begun to demand low-sodium food alternatives.

Consequently, many companies in the food and beverage industry have begun to reformulate their existing products with a new challenge: Maximizing taste while limiting sodium content.

From Disproquima, we would like to present our sodium substitutes to ensure an incredible final taste without compromising consumers' health.

WHAT ABOUT SODIUM?

Excessive salt intake contributes to high blood pressure, increasing the risk of heart disease, stroke, and kidney diseases. That is why at the World Health Assembly in May 2013, all Member States of the World Health Organization signed up to the target to reduce salt intake by 30% by 2025. As a result, many countries started reporting reductions in salt levels in foods, although most programs were voluntary.

However, these new measures were not enough: Nowadays, while the physiological requirement for salt is less than 5 grams per day, most populations eat between 9 and 12 grams.

In industrial countries, about 75-80% of dietary salt is obtained through processed food consumption, 5-10% is naturally present in food, and the remaining 10-15% comes from salt added during cooking or at the table.

SALT REDUCTION BY FOOD REFORMULATION

A growing percentage of the population knows the potentially adverse consequences of excessive salt intake. 

2 in 5 consumers globally say they have decreased their sodium/salt intake in the past 12 months.

Consequently, several companies in the food and beverage industry have already changed their product portfolios to promote healthier diets.

- Top categories of food and beverage launches tracked with low/no/reduced sodium from 2018 to 2021 show that baby & toddlers is the top category, followed by Sauces & Seasonings and Soft Drinks. Baby & toddlers is the fastest growing categories.

Replacing salt is not a simple task since salt provides a pleasant taste, acts as a microbiological preservative, is a flavor and aroma enhancer, and influences rheology, freezing point, water activity, protein hydration, and lipid binding.

Our salt replacer NutraSal® has been developed by Nutramax to serve the food industry with products low in sodium with an incredible final taste to ensure customer satisfaction and to ensure microbiological stability. 

REFERENCES

- Limit fat, salt, and sugar intake. WHO. Available on: http://www.emro.who.int/nutrition/reduce-fat-salt-and-sugar-intake/index.html

- Webster J, Trieu K, Dunford E, Hawkes C. Target Salt 2025: A Global Overview of National Programs to Encourage the Food Industry to Reduce Salt in Foods (2014). Nutrients, 6(8):3274-3287. Available on: https://doi.org/10.3390/nu6083274

- Reducing sodium. International Food & Beverage Alliance. Available on: https://ifballiance.org/commitments/product-formulation/reducing-sodium/

- Kloss L, Meyer JD, Graeve L, Vetter W. Sodium intake and its reduction by food reformulation in the European Union — A review (2015). NFS Journal, 1, 9–19. Available on: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nfs.2015.03.001

-Innova Data Base. Available on: https://innovadatabase.com