On 7 September 2011, PureCircle Limited (PureCircle), the world's leading producer and marketer of high purity stevia products, announces that it steps up expansion in stevia sweetener market in the EU. Meanwhile, some domestic stevia sweetener producers also expressed their aims. All these above is because EU market of stevia sweeteners may be opened by the end of this year when the EU approves stevia and stevia glycosides (EU approval), according to CCM’s latest issue of Sweeteners China News.
PureCircle established a new European headquarter in London and signed a UK distribution agreement with Prinova Group LLC. (Prinova Europe), a global food ingredient supplier. According to Jordi Ferre, President of PureCircle's Commercial Division, the company is now going to take the important step by establishing new PureCircle business entity in the UK, which will enable it to partner with customers across EU.
PureCircle and domestic stevia sweetener producers plan to expand their EU business thanks to the approval. At present, stevia and steviol glycosides, two major stevia sweeteners, are not permitted for sale as food or food ingredients in the UK and most other EU countries. But by the end of this year, the use of stevia sweetener will be approved in the EU, attracting related producers' penetration into the market.
In order to get viewpoints of domestic stevia sweetener producers, CCM International investigates six major stevia sweetener producers in China, four of which are big companies, including GLG Life Tech Corporation (GLG), PureCircle (Jiangxi) Co.,Ltd (Jiangxi Purecircle), Shandong Huaxian Stevia Co., Ltd. (Shandong Huaxian) and Qufu Haigen Stevia Products Co., Ltd. (Qufu Haigen). The left two are small-size and medium-size companies, including Jining Aoxing Stevia Products Co., Ltd. (Jining Aoxing) and Heilongjiang Land Reclamation Huiju Hailin Stevioside Co., Ltd. (Heilongjiang Hailin).
According to CCM International's survey, lots of manufacturers are impressively attracted by huge market potential of stevia sweeteners in the EU. All of the six internal producers CCM International interviewed anticipated a prosperous future growth of stevia sweeteners in the EU market.
Moreover, stevia sweetener market in the EU may enjoy fast growth, especially those high purity ones. Take France as a good example, with temporary approval for high purity stevia sweeteners from the EU, it saw speedy development of stevia awareness and market adoption in low calorie sweetener category. A similar situation is likely to occur across all EU countries this time, remarkably boosting domestic stevia sweetener industry. This predication is well agreed by all six stevia sweetener producers CCM International investigated. Besides, they added that currently high purity sweeteners, such as RA80, RA95 and RA97, are popularly received in non-EU markets. And this trend will probably happen in EU market too.
At present, the six domestic producers are waiting for the opening of the stevia sweetener market in the EU, and they choose different ways to enter the EU market. Among them, Jining Aoxing and Jiangxi Purecirlce will enter directly on their own, while the other four would like to cooperate with overseas distributors and traders. Whichever way they choose, since the attraction is so appealing, domestic producers will spare no effort to export as much stevia sweeteners as possible to the EU. However, on the other side, since the attraction is so appealing, abundant of producers will fight to seize a market share, leading to intense competition among them.
Additionally, EU approval may greatly benefit domestic stevia sweetener industry. According to CCM International's survey, stevia sweeteners are export-oriented products in China, whose estimated export volume accounts for about 60%-70% of total output of stevia sweeteners, Some companies export even more, such as Shandong Huaxian and Qufu Haigen, whose present export volumes take up 80% of their total output. Hence, EU approval is going to accelerate domestic players' export business.
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(Guangzhou China, October 9, 2011)
Sweeteners China News is a monthly newsletter published by CCM International Limited. Based on China market, CCM offers timely update and close follow up of China’s various kind of sweeteners market dynamics, analyze the market data and trends, Major columns include market dynamic, company dynamic, raw material supply, price update, import & export analysis, Consumption Trend & Competitiveness.
