UHTCO enters food retail with Peruvian Harvest
Posted - July 1, 2011
UHTCO enters food retail with Peruvian Harvest
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La Vita Launches New Cookies
Posted - December 18, 2008
Crunchy, Healthy Cookies Deliver Old-Fashioned Good Taste: La Vita Introduces Eight New Prebiotic Cookie Varieties
La Vita Health Foods has introduced a line of cookies with a low glycemic index that are also prebiotic, vegan and Kosher, and cholesterol, wheat, dairy and lactose-free. These La Vita All Natural Crunchy Cookies contain no high fructose corn syrup, maltitol, artificial sweeteners, or preservatives and still have a year-long shelf life.
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Pasta Profits
Posted - November 1, 2008
Alb-Gold : Inspiring noodles
By John Coghlan
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Chocolate for a Good Cause
Posted - November 1, 2008
Pacari Chocolate Goes Beyond Sweet Actions
By Lucia Lorente - as printed in O.W.N. Fall 2008
In Ecuador, some rural areas do not have access to electricity. Communities use a huge number of battery-operated flashlights, consuming 10-12 batteries per month at a total expense of around 5-8 USD
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Amish and Organic
Posted - November 1, 2008
Amish Naturals: Sharing the grain
By Adrian Larose - as printed in O.W.N. Fall 2008
Many would agree most people do not connect with nature these days. We
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Colombian Organic Firm
Posted - November 1, 2008
Daabon Sets Mood for a Greener Colombia
By Adriana Michael - as printed in O.W.N. Fall 2008
Daabon Organic, a third generation family-owned business in Colombia, is run by Alberto Davila Diazgranados, affectionately known to all as Don Alberto. He has turned a family farm founded by his father in 1914 into a progressive international enterprise, a pioneer in sustainable agriculture and a leading grower and exporter of organic bananas, palm oil, cacao and coffee. Don Alberto is an easy to approach man who enjoys the company of others. He certainly meets many people, running a company that employs over 1500 people and deals with over 400 contractors.
Keeping a business alive for almost 100 years is a challenging task.What has been the formula to its success?
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Sustainably-Packaged German Snacks
Posted - July 30, 2008
Herr Foods Furthers Sustainably with Pump Retrofit
Germany
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Guilt-Free Sweets
Posted - May 1, 2008
Guilt-Free Candy to Satisfy Your Sweet Tooth:
Fair-trade, organic and vegan treats heating the shelves as organics expands beyond health
By Adriana Michael - as printed in O.W.N. Summer 2008
Fruit drops. Gummy bears. Lollipops. Chocolate bars. Many consumers have a love-hate relationship with sweets, and today many consider the environmental effects of products containing everything from high-fructose GMO corn syrup to synthetic calorie-free or GMO-derived sweeteners, colours and flavours.
More entrepreneurs are beginning to create sweet treats in certified organic and fair trade qualities.
A craving for sweets is only natural.”The very first food we taste is mother’s milk, and that’s very sweet,” says Luna Roth, president of Canadian organic candy firm Pure Fun Confections. “We’re born with a craving for sweets.” In moderation, a sweet treat is a good thing.
Pure Fun is among the companies offering guilt-free snacks healthier for shoppers, the environment and the workers who produce them. Its products are certified organic, kosher, vegan, and fair trade.
Red beets naturally colour the organic candy cane Pure Fun launched this Christmas. Organic brown rice syrup is Pure Fun’s sweetener. Roth says it is more nutritious than common sweeteners, but about 3 times more expensive.
The certified organic, gluten-, soy- and peanut-free and kosher lollipops with cane sugar from US firm YummyEarth are another guilt-free hit. Says co-founder Rob Wunder: “The very first social implication that comes to mind is all the children with severe allergies that are finally able to have a regular lollipop and share them with friends at the playground and at birthday parties.”
Allergic reactions to conventional sweets indicate menacing ingredients. By contrast, YummyEarth’s lollipops are naturally coloured, with red from Japanese purple carrots and colours from pumpkins and blackcurrants. The sour apple lollipop gets its green glow from wheatgrass - and, Wunder says, a nutritional kick.
Crispy Cat, a US company, bills its made-with-organic products as the first organic candy bars. “It’s actually pretty much impossible to find the word
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Delicious Ecuadorian-Made Dark Chocolate
Posted - April 16, 2008
Pacari: Delicious Dark Chocolate from Ecuador
The world’s first made-in-Ecuador 100% organic certified chocolate, fairly-traded too, is set to make its US debut.
Pacari Chocolate co-founders Carla Barboto and Santiago Peralta studied European chocolate-making techniques before working closely with several small communities in Ecuador to create their company’s current product line.
After selling Ecuador-origin chocolate to European chocolatiers for some time, the young entrepreneurs eventually decided it was time to create a made-in-Ecuador, own-brand. “We realized that our chocolate couvertures were being used to produce some award-winning chocolates in Europe, so it was time for us to create our own label,” said Peralta.
The first-ever
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Beyond Corn Syrup
Posted - September 1, 2007
Save Us from Corn Syrup:
Try Low-Calorie Natural Sweeteners
By David Giovinazzo - as printed in O.W.N. Fall 2007
A visitor to our planet viewing the six o’clock news couldn’t help but seeing that in many countries, huge waste-lines and diabetes are big problems. The American Centre for Disease Control and Prevention states that, in the past 15 years, the number of people suffering from diabetes II has more than doubled. The culprits? Certainly two are refined sugar and corn syrup. Many think high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is the main cause.
HFCS raises insulin levels higher than refined sugar. And it causes the liver to make triglycerides - a bad cholesterol. In the past years, with sugar tariffs up, and corn prices down, HFCS use has boomed. Now you can find it in almost all processed foods, from breakfast cereals to canned foods - much to the detriment of those suffering its consequences.
What can be done? Several low-calorie, natural sweeteners have come to the rescue. One of the most popular is stevia -a plant related to the chrysanthemum and sunflower. Three hundred times sweeter than sugar, it was first discovered 200 years ago by the Guarani people in Paraguay. But both the US Food and Drug Administration and Health Canada have banned it as a sweetener, only allowing it to be advertised as a dietary supplement.
The European Union has also banned it. But, given the need for sweeteners to replace refined sugar and corn syrup, why hasn’t more research been done on stevia? At least one lobby group in the European Stevia Association (EUSTAS) founded in 2006 wants just that. EUSTAS’ goal is the compilation of an application for the permission of the sweet contents (steviol glycoside) of the plant Stevia rebaudiana as food additive to be submitted to the Scientific Committee on Food (SCF) of the European Commission.
Meanwhile, the giants Cargill and Coca Cola have joined to “refine” stevia, to reduce it’s aftertaste that some users have complained about. The two giants have described rebiana, the processed stevia, as “the industry’s first natural, zero-calorie sweetener.” But the rebiana is processed, so not so natural. And, with stevia’s two hundred-year history, neither is a natural, zero-calorie sweetener new.
Nor is stevia itself the only natural, low-calorie, sweetener. Wholesome Sweeteners, a Texas-based company, has come out with “Organic Zero”, made from organically grown sugar, but without calories. Seventy percent as sweet as sugar, and with a glycemic index of zero, consumers can use it in baking. Glycemic indexing ranks carbohydrates according to their effect on blood sugar levels - so is vital to diabetics and other with metabolic disorders. Karen Stevenson of Wholesome Sweeteners explains, “Organic Zero is also highly digestible - important for people who prefer calorie-free, low glycemic-index sweeteners as many of the others on the market cause significant digestive distress.”
Another natural sweetener is banana syrup. “As far as we know” says Daniel Orlich of Florida Products, of Costa Rica, “we were the first company developing banana syrup as an alternative natural sweetener that blends well with milk.” The syrup, he adds, is good at masking unpleasant flavours in some foods, and is rich in potassium. A company also busy making low-glycemic syrup is New York based Organic Nectars. It makes one from the agave plant, known for its lowest glycemic index of all natural sweeteners.
And then there is panela a “peasants food” Latin America, also common in Asia and India. It is a granulated, yellow-brown caramel product that you can eat as is, or dissolved in liquids. It is sweet, but has more nutrients than sugar, such as vitamins A, C, D and E and glycolic acid, according to Juan Manuel Duran of sugar cane farm Lucerna in Colombia.
Meanwhile, growers are cultivating stevia in South America, China and Canada. While the Coca Cola Cargill project is recent, smaller producers have promoted it for years. Cindy Levington, who, with her husband Paul, runs Suede Hills Organic Farm in Savona, British Columbia states “The farm first grew stevia about four years ago, starting with 400 plants. Now, we plant about 15,000 annually.” But the market for stevia shows its growth in her e-mail box. “I receive e-mails daily, from those who want to buy not only my product, but also my entire crop!”
In 2006, Global Industry Analysts have reported that the global sweetener market is growing at 3.7%. Where health improves, profits follow. With refined sugar and corn syrup - and certain artificial sweeteners, showing themselves far from ideal, little doubt the market for low-calorie, truly natural sweeteners like stevia will boom. And hopefully, many waste lines will bust.
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Fair-trade, organic and vegan treats heating the shelves as organics expands beyond health
Try Low-Calorie Natural Sweeteners
