Importance: Copyright by Guangzhou CCM Chemicals Co., Ltd. Suggest for reading instead of downloading. Any distribution or citation of this article for whatever use is forbidden. This summary is drafted on base of Market Overview of Food Additives in China that was finished in 2001, and is in highlight form. Only some facts or conclusion is listed. Some details information in regard to the manufacturers and statistics is not included in the present sample report. Please click here for the main content of the update report . Visitors are requested to Contact Us by email or directly to the below address for the update report. Thank you. Last update: June 2001 Main Content
1. Food Additives Production History in China In 1950s when People¡¯s Republic of China was just founded, the food additive production was almost vacant. The two large food additive items at that time were sodium glutamate and yeast, whose production was 300MT/year and 12MT/year, respectively. During 1960s, China began to do research work on food additives and made some breakthrough. The first zymin manufacturer in Wuxi city was born, with production of 10Mt per year. In the mean time, Chinese researchers developed their own methods to produce xylitol, citric acid and saccharin. But the food additive industry came to a halt during 1970s because of the Culture Revolution. It is only since 1980s, when China began the economic reform, that the food additive industry began to grow up substantially. The emergence of beverage industry in the 1980s drove the food additive industry to a great extent. Entering 1990s, the Chinese food additive industry grew at fast speed. The improved trading environment and the flow of foreign companies into China to set up joint ventures accelerated the development of food additive industry. In1991, the number of approved food additive reached to 1044 and the total production of food additives reached to 470,000 tons per year. It was the first time in the history that the production of some food additives exceeded10,000 tons per year, including sodium glutamate, citric acid, zymin, yeast, flavor and fragrance, saccharin, sorbitol. According to the Food Additive Sanitation Standard GB2760-1996, issued in 1996, there were 21 categories of food additives, totally 1460 species, to use in China. In 1998, the National Food Additive Standard Technology Committee (NFASTC) approved 11 new products and 3 flavors. The total number of food additives allowed to use increased to 1474. Recent years the food additives industry in China went into a developing stage. It is estimated that the food additive production in 1998 and 1999 was 1.3 million MT and 1.6 million MT, respectively. The production value of food additive industry in 1999 was RMB 20 billions, about 2.7% of the total production value of food industry. 2. Current Production of Food Additives At present there are over 400 big food additive manufacturers in China. The strong items of food additives include sodium glutamate, citric acid, xylitol, sodium benzoate, sorbic acid/potassium sorbate, and synthetic sweeteners like saccharin, aspartame. According to the statistics from China Food Additive Production & Application Industrial Association (CFAPAIA), the production of some important food additives in the past few years is listed as follows: Table 1. Statistics of major food additive production in the past few years. (unit: MT)
3. Brief introduction to Some Food Additives in China Among the 20 acidity modifiers, 17 are available in China, like citric acid, fumaric acid, adipic acid, phosphoric acid, acetic acid, lactic acid and tartaric acid. - Citric Acid The present capacity of citric acid is over 300,000MT/year. In 1999, China exported over 180,000 tons of citric acid to oversea market, No.1 exporter in the world. Because of the cheap production cost, the Chinese citric acid is very competitive in the world market. This, on the other, incurred an accuse from USA for ¡°dumping¡± . 12 Chinese manufacturers responded the suit and won at last. At present the smaller producers with capacity less than 10,000MT/year are being kicked out of market gradually because of the inferior position in competition. The biggest producer is CCBA, with capacity of over 100,000Mt/year. - Fumaric Acid The total production capacity of fumaric acid (industrial grade and food grade) is about 30,000Mt/year. However the Chinese fumaric acid has no ability to compete Korean material and Germany material. The food grade fumaric acid is under development in China. - Adipic Acid The total production capacity of adipic acid is about 30,000Mt/year. The biggest manufacturer is Sinochem Liaoyang. - Food Grade Acetic Acid The production of industrial grade acetic acid in China is about 500,000Mt/year. But the production of food grade acetic acid is not large. The food grade acetic acid is used for the production of vinegar. So far the vinegar production in China is over 2 million MT/year. - Lactic Acid The production capacity of lactic acid in China is about 20,000Mt/year. There are about 30 manufacturers of lactic acid in China and the actual production is about 10,000MT/year. China is weak in the production of lactic acid derivatives. - Tartaric Acid The production capacity of industrial tartaric acid in China is about 4,000Mt/year while the food grade D-tartaric acid capacity in China is only about 300Mt/year. It is a growing item in China. - Maleic Acid Maleic acid is also available in China. The total production capacity is expected to be 3,000Mt/year. The anti-oxidants allowed to be used in China include BHA, BHT, propyl gallate, PG, D-sodium isoascorbiate, VE. Because of the high price, the actual application of them in China is not are wide as that in oversea countries. - BHA It is reported that there is only one manufacturer of BHA in China. - BHT There are two manufacturer so BHT in China. The total production capacity is about 2,000Mt/year. - Propy Gallate The production of propyl gallate is quite small, about 50Mt/year. - D-sodium isoascorbate The production capacity of D-sodium isoascorbiate is about 4,000Mt/year. There are more than 7 manufacturers in China. - Polyphenol Recently the production of polyphenol, an extract from green tea, has been increased in China. But the content of polyphenol is low and the quality is not good. In addition, Chinese polyphenol is mainly for export. The domestic application is quite small. There are 49 colorants allowed to be used as food additives in China. 8 of them are synthetic ones. The total production of colorant in China is more than 15,000Mt/year. 90% of them are natural colorants. Natural colorant is good for its health safety but is not stable under normal circumstance. Among the natural colorants, caramel is the largest items of colorant in China. The total production of it is more than 10,000Mt/year. Other important colorants include capsanthin, red dyes, radish red, etc. Most of these items are exported to Japan. Emulsifier is a big item among the food additives. There are 30 emulsifier products allowed to be used in China. At present China mainly produces fatty polyalcohol ester and lecithin. The total production of food grade emulsifier in China is about 20,000Mt/year. - Fatty Lyceride The biggest items of emulsifier is fatty glyceride. There are over 40 manufacturers to produce this product in China. The total production is expected to be 5,000Mt/year, 50% of them are for food application. Recent years more and more Chinese manufacturers are using molecular distillation technology in order to obtain the product with high content. - Fatty Saccharose Ester China begin to research on fatty saccharose ester in 1980s. Now the production capacity of this product is more than 3,000Mt/year. Its derivative, fatty saccharose polyester, is low in calories and can replace cooking oil. Some researchers including South China University & Technology are doing research on it. - Tween and Span Tween and Span. There are over 10 manufacturers of Tween and Span. But these manufacturers mainly produce industrial grade product. Recently some manufacturers began to produce food grade Tween and Span. It is reported that there are three Chinese manufacturers are producing food grade tween and span. - Propylene Glycol Ester China began to research on propylene glycol ester in 1980s. The researchers include Beijing Chemical Research Institute, Shanghai Chemical Reagent General Factory, etc. The present production is no more than 1,000Mt/year. - Lecithin The development of lecithin grows fast in the recent year, especially in the northern China. Comparing with foreign product, the Chinese lecithin is low in content, because Chinese manufacturers can not solve the problem of decolorization, deoderization. There are over 100 zymin manufacturers in China. The total production capacity is about 400,000MT/year. The actual production in 1998 is about 220,000MT. The production of zymin is monotonous. E.g., the main zymin items are saccharifying enzyme and amylase. The production of these two products accounts to about 80% of the total production. Many oversea manufacturers launched into China in the 1990s. The biggest foreign investor is Novo Nordisk. Nutrition intensifiers include vitamins, mineral, amino acids and protein. There are 61 nutrition intensifiers allowed to use in China. Now China can produce all the vitamins except biotin. It can be said that Chinese vitamins are becoming ever competitive in the world market, especially VBs, VC, VE. The amino acid allowed to add in the food include lysine HCL, DL-methionine. Now China can produce all kinds of 18 amino acids that are essential to human body. The production of nutrition intensifier is a kind of developing and promising food additives. Many big foreign companies are staring at the big pie and starting to share it. We will discuss it in our later series. There are many kinds of preservatives allowed to use in China, including dehydro acetic acid, sodium diacetate, sulfur dioxide, potassium metabisulfate, etc. The big preservatives items in China include sodium benzoate and sorbic acid/potassium sorbate, the capacity of which is 60,000MT/year and 15,000MT/year, respectively. And the export of these product is about 20,000Mt/year and 5,000Mt/year, respectively. There are two types of sweeteners, nutrient type and non-nutrient type. The former include sugar and sugar alcohol like glucose, fructose, isomerose, maltose, sorbitol, xylitol, mannitol, etc. The latter chemical synthetic sweeteners like saccharin, cyclamete, stevia, aspartame, acesulfame potassium (ACK), licorice. All these nutrient sweeteners and no-nutrient sweeteners are available in China. Some items are strong in the world market, like sorbitol, saccharin, etc. We will report sugar situation later, then chemical synthetic sweeteners, ¡ There are 26 thickeners allowed to use in China. The main thickeners include pectin, karrageeenen, gelatin, xanthan, starch and modified starch, and CMC. - Pectin The production of pectin is no more than 500Mt/year. The main reason is that the product yield is low. Every year China has to import about 1,000Mt petin. - Karrageeenen Karrageeenen is available in China but the production is quite little, about 100Mt per year. - CMC CMC industry develops fast in recent year. It is estimated that the total production of CMC in China is about 100,000Mt/year but only 2,000Mt are used for good application. - Gelatin It is estimated that the demand for gelatin in China is about 20,000Mt/year but so far China can produce no more than 6,000Mt/year. The balance has to be imported. - Starch and Modified Starch The starch industry is severely competitive in China. Among over 1,000 starch manufacturers in China, only those whose production is more than 100,000Mt/year survived in the past competition. In 1997, the starch production came to 2.63 millions tons. Part of them were further used to make glutamate, yeast, sorbitol, glucose, modified starch, citric acid, enzyme, VC, etc. The flavor ingredient industry developed fast in the past few years. The biggest ones include sodium glutamate and yeast extract, whose production is over 650,000MT/year and 100,000MT/year, respectively. Recent years China also began the production of guanosine monophosphate (GMP) and inosine monophophate (IMP). There are about 950 Flavor & fragrance species in China, 742 of them is used as food additives. The production of flavor and fragrance is estimated to be 75,000MT/year and 85,000MT/year, respectively. But the food grade F & F is only about 30,000MT/year. Now China is strong in some synthetic flavors like maltol, ethyle malton, vanillin, etc. For detailed info, welcome to contact Guangzhou CCM Chemicals Co. Ltd. |