Welcome to the December issue of Sweeteners China News published by CCM International, a professional consulting company which has been extensively and intently focusing on the dynamics of China's sweetener industry.
China's sucrose price continues to decrease in early December, which may have different effects on different types of sweeteners. On one hand, some sweeteners made from sucrose will benefit from the cost decrease of raw material, such as FOS and sucralose. On the other hand, those sweeteners which are mainly used to replace the sweetness of sucrose are also affected, such as starch sugar and high intensity sweeteners (HIS); their price competitiveness is reduced to some extent. However, the influence of the sucrose price decrease on HIS is much smaller than that on starch sugar owing to HIS' very low unit sweetness price and fixable demand from beverages and foods with low or zero calorie.
Besides, Chinese government has begun to carry out an environmental verification of starch, starch sugar and alcohol producers in China, which may not affect large starch sugar enterprises obviously thanks to their efficient sewage treatment technology and bargaining power, but it may increase the environmental protection cost and raw material cost of small starch sugar producers in China.
Moreover, the EU Commission has finally approved stevia sweetener's application as a natural and non-caloric sweetener in foods and beverages in the EU, which may provide great opportunities for China's stevia sweetener industry.

