Coke & Pepsi will still use aspartame even though they plan stevia sweeteners

[Guest guest]

lohud.com

I didn't think that Coke and Pepsi would give up aspartame because

if they did people would wake up well all over the world and know

what poisoned them. They are simply adding another drink with stevia

and will continue to poison the world with aspartame.

 

Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum, Founder

Mission Possible International

9270 River Club Parkway

Duluth, Georgia 30097

770 242-2599

www.mpwhi.com, www.dorway.com and www.wnho.net

Aspartame Toxicity Center, www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

Aspartame Information List, www.mpwhi.com

 

 

 

August 1, 2008

 

Pepsi producing new zero-calorie natural sweetener

 

Jerry Gleeson

The Journal News

 

The next front in the Cola Wars may be a zero-calorie natural

sweetener derived from a plant in South America.

 

PepsiCo Inc. of Purchase yesterday said it is teaming with the maker

of Equal to produce PureVia, an ingredient that the beverage maker

plans to include in some of its products following a review by the

U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

 

PureVia is produced from the leaves of the stevia plant. PepsiCo said

stevia is about 200 times sweeter than sugar. Its purified component,

Reb A, is drawn from the sweetest part of the stevia leaf.

 

Stevia sweeteners are used in about a dozen countries, PepsiCo

spokesman David DeCecco said. The Japanese have sweetened teas with

it for about 30 years, he said. PureVia took four years for PepsiCo

and its partner, Whole Earth Sweetener Co., a subsidiary of Merisant

Co., to develop.

 

PepsiCo and Whole Earth Sweetener will jointly own and market PureVia

globally. They will buy the sweetener from PureCircle, a supplier of Reb A.

 

PepsiCo will launch SoBe Life, a flavored beverage sweetened with

PureVia, in Latin America this year. A PureVia tabletop sweetener

that can be used in both hot and cold beverages and sprinkled on

cereal will be released in the United States this fall.

 

The sweetener tastes good, has no calories, and meets growing

consumer demand for natural products, DeCecco said.

 

" It gives us a trifecta, " he said.

 

Coca-Cola also is developing a stevia sweetener with agriculture

giant Cargill. They also have an application before the FDA.

 

John Sicher, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest in Bedford

Hills, said the soft drink industry has looked for years for natural,

no-calorie equivalents to the widely-used artificial sweetener aspartame.

 

Fashioning a sweetener that replicates the flavor of sugar for a mass

market can be a challenge, since consumers' palates vary widely.

 

" Taste is so subjective, " Sicher said. " Human beings are accustomed

to the taste of sugar and measure other sweeteners against sugar. "

 

PepsiCo and Coca-Cola will continue to use aspartame, Sicher said,

but they see opportunities in stevia.

 

" There is a subset, and probably a growing subset, of consumers who

are interested in natural products. If these new stevia-based

sweeteners meet the taste requirement, they could give both Pepsi and

Coke a whole new arena for product innovation, " he said.

 

" The key is going to be, they have to not just be natural, the

sweeteners also have to taste good, " he said. " Given the research

going on, it's likely they will, but ultimately consumers will make

that decision. "