More Packaged-Food Producers Replace High Fructose Corn Syrup

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Sugar Gains Favor on Labels

Despite Costs, More Packaged-Food Producers Replace High Fructose Corn Syrup

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By ANJALI CORDEIRO

High fructose corn syrup, the sugar alternative used to sweeten sodas,

cookies, condiments and cereals, is beginning to lose some ground in the

packaged-food industry.

More big-name food and beverage products—including Kraft Foods Inc.'s

Wheat Thins —have begun dropping the ingredient in favor of sugar,

despite a big difference in cost, saying they are responding to consumer

preferences for ingredients perceived as more natural.

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Associated Press

Hunt's ketchup will use sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup.

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ConAgra Foods Inc. in May will start replacing the sweetener with sugar

in its Hunt's tomato ketchup. " That's what consumers are looking

for—simpler ingredient listings and ingredients they are familiar with, "

ConAgra spokeswoman sen said. ConAgra said consumers

preferred the taste of the new product in tests.

In recent months, Kraft has taken high fructose corn syrup out of the

recipes for its 100-calorie pack Nabisco cookies, Wheat Thins crackers

and most of its namesake salad dressings. With Wheat Thins, Kraft said

it saw discussions on its Web site on the subject of high fructose corn

syrup and received comments directly from consumers, pushing it to

remove the sweetener.

PepsiCo Inc. is in the process of replacing high fructose corn syrup in

Gatorade products with sugar and other sweeteners. Pepsi said its

research showed many althletes preferred the idea of Gatorade without

the syrup.

Many consumers worry that HFCS is worse for them than sugar. Some

critics call high fructose corn syrup an artificial sweetener, as it is

heavily processed, even though many experts say there is little

nutritional difference between it and sugar.

The move away from HFCS, combined with lower consumption of soft drinks,

has weighed on U.S. sales of the sweetener at manufacturers such as

Archer s Midland Co. and Corn Products International Inc.

Archer s Midland, which declined to comment, doesn't break out

sales of U.S. high fructose corn syrup. On a recent conference call,

however, the company said U.S. volumes for the corn-sweetener industry

have been lower, reflecting a drop in consumption of carbonated soft

drinks. ADM said on the call that it is counting on better sales in

markets such as Mexico to help offset declines in the U.S.

Corn Products International didn't respond to calls on this subject.

Consumption of high fructose corn syrup fell 1.3% in 2009 in the U.S.

from a year earlier, according to research firm Euromonitor.

The Corn Refiners Association has been running television ads that try

to counter the perception that the syrup is inferior. On its Web site,

www.sweetsurprise.com, the association says high fructose corn syrup " is

simply a kind of corn sugar. It has the same number of calories as sugar

and is handled similarly by the body. "

Audrae kson, president of the Corn Refiners Association, said, " This

is nothing more than a marketing gimmick, " referring to packaged-food

companies that switch ingredients. " They've switched from one sugar to

another, " Ms. kson said. She argues that eventually consumers will

end up paying more.

Sales of high fructose syrup have been pressured for some years as many

Americans have moved away from sodas, which are heavy users of the

sweetener. But experts say that the sweetener's prices have now also

come under pressure in the U.S. amid the recent shifts by branded food

and beverage makers. In the Midwest, high fructose corn syrup has been

selling for 16.75 cents a pound on average, said Ron Sterk, editor of

trade publication Milling and Baking News, down three cents from last year.

As they try to hold onto market share, companies shifting to sugar from

HFCS say they aren't raising prices for consumers despite their higher

costs for raw materials.

Early this year, the price of sugar in the U.S averaged over $1,000 a

ton compared to about $695 a ton for one variety of high fructose corn

syrup, LMC International economist Nick Fereday said. He puts annual

consumption of sugar at nine million tons in the U.S. and corn syrup at

seven million.

In 2009, use of sugar in canned, bottled and frozen foods was flat from

a year ago at 427,000 tons in the U.S., according to the U.S. Department

of Agriculture.

Years ago, high fructose corn syrup got some bad press. One piece of

research in 2004 from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center,

Louisiana State University and University of North Carolina raised

questions about whether the syrup was playing a role in the national

obesity epidemic.

One of the authors of that study, University of North Carolina professor

Barry Popkin, said that since then he and other researchers have

concluded that regular sugar and high fructose corn syrup " have the same

exact effect on obesity and diabetes and on heart disease. It's not that

one is better. "

More consumers are paying attention to sweeteners. Laurie Ledgard, a

stay-at-home mother in Suffield, Conn., said she does look at the sugar

contents and tries to avoid the syrup.

" If I have to have sugar, I'd rather have the natural sugar than high

fructose corn syrup, " she said. Still, she acknowledges that " there is a

devil in sugar as well, and you don't want a lot of that either. "

Write to Anjali Cordeiro at anjali.cordeiro@...