Sodium reduction 75% Percentage of
PepsiCo global food portfolio that aims to meet – or beat – category sodium targets by 2030. PepsiCo
seeing declines in sodium intakes falter. Despite this, the initial success of the sodium scheme points to the potential of salt reduction programmes, with Action on Salt finding that 85% of Brits support government action forcing companies to cut unnecessary salt from their products, according to a poll by the group.
Worth the salt? With increasing enthusiasm for sodium reduction, what options are there to keep consumers’ palates happy – while also improving their health? One option is to reduce salt intake gradually. As Sonia Pombo, a research fellow and Campaign Lead at Action on Salt explains, this often leads to longer- term benefits for companies and consumers. “Our preferred approach would be those slow reductions where possible, not having to use salt replacement because what we’re also trying to do is try and get people’s preferences for that salty taste to go down as well,” she says. “Whereas if you’re always trying to maintain that salty hit time after time, you’re going to reach a point where you can’t reduce things.” But with a lack of compulsory targets and guidelines for companies to follow, how can the necessary reductions be encouraged? At Action on Salt, Pombo and her colleagues work to promote salt reduction by meeting with government bodies regularly, providing them with evidence for the benefits of sodium reduction, while also monitoring food companies regularly to find out the feasibility of salt reduction in different products and pushing stronger monitoring and targets.
“Our preferred approach would be... slow reductions where possible, not having to use salt replacement because what we’re also trying to do is try and get people’s preferences for that salty taste to go down as well.”
Sonia Pombo
This is not to say that companies aren’t keen to meet consumer demands themselves. For instance, PepsiCo recently announced its aim for 75% of its global food portfolio to meet – or be below – category sodium targets by 2030. “We set new 2030 sodium and diverse ingredient goals to help be a catalyst for change in the industry and help address ongoing public health concerns of excess sodium intake and low consumption of food groups and ingredients that are important sources of nutrition,” explains René Lammers, the multinational’s chief scientific officer. “We’ll aim to meet these nutrition ambitions through a combination of current offerings, reformulation of
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our existing products and innovation to come up with new ones.” With several products already meeting these targets, PepsiCo offers low-sodium options across the globe, from its Lightly Salted Lay’s chips (USA), Sabritas salted potato chips (Mexico), and low- sodium corn chips (Australia). In an effort to reduce the sodium levels across their product offerings, PepsiCo starts this process right at R&D, ensuring ingredients offer the best possible flavours to the kitchen – where, in turn, experts study salt crystal size, shape and formulation to cut sodium levels. Another option is exploring sodium alternatives, which replace salt with a healthier alternative. One option here is potassium chloride. A naturally occurring mineral salt, similar to sodium chloride, potassium nonetheless has the opposite effect, cutting the hypertension commonly associated with regular salt. The switch to potassium also has the added benefit of helping to meet WHO dietary guidelines. But switching out sodium for potassium isn’t as simple as it sounds, as companies have to consider taste, texture and smell when changing a popular recipe. Even worse, potassium chloride can only be used in limited quantities before it stops conveying the intended saltiness – and instead leaves a bitter taste. This inevitably means that R&D often turn to bitter blockers, flavour modulators or synthetic additives. As Pombo points out, this can in turn cause labelling issues: “I believe a lot of companies are quite hesitant to use that because it doesn’t give to you things like clean labelling.”
Potassium is not the only sodium alternative, with some insiders positing MSG as a potential option. And why not? Offering up to two-thirds of the sodium levels of regular salt – but still enhancing flavour enhancement – MSG is growing in popularity with the US market expecting a CAGR growth of 4.09% over the next five years. Another alternative making waves is MicroSalt, a 100% natural salt alternative that is relatively new to the market – but which is nonetheless taking the sodium sector by storm thanks to its unique product offering. The manufacturing process produces a particle coated with nano-sized salt crystals, which delivers a salty flavour with 50% less sodium. Food developers and manufacturers are also looking beyond traditional alternatives to cut sodium levels. “I was talking to a company a few months ago about thermal processing,” Pombo says. “You use pressure cooking essentially.” Through this technique, Pombo explains, food manufacturers don’t need to use as much salt as it maintains the nutrients and flavour. A good example here is Cargill’s compacting
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