ISSUE NO 27 FEB ‘19 2 FROM THE EDITOR, 3 SWEETNER FOR SUGAR INDUSTRY SWEET NEWS FOR FARMERS: NOW, ELECTION REPORT: ‘LOAN OF A DISEASE-RESISTANT SUGARCANE ₹12,000 CRORES’ Sujakumari M Keerthiga R R Indira Gandhi Krishi Vishwavidyalaya has The Narendra Modi government is looking at yet produced tissue culture saplings of disease-free another relief package for sugar companies, and this sugarcane plant with naturally high level of is going to be twice the size of one announced in sweetness, which will translate into good quality September 2018.This relief package facilitates the sugar in mills. This is the first time such a sapling has loan which is nearly ₹12,000 crore for which the ex- been produced. chequer will bear 5-6% interest subvention for 5 IGKV has four lakh such saplings available for sale years. The loans will be granted for enhancing at a rate of ₹8 per piece. The IGKV tissue culture lab ethanol production. The package is being finalised by developed the variety using sugarcane from the Prime Minister’s Office, Finance Ministry, Coimbatore. Lab in charge, Dr SL Verma said, Agriculture Ministry and the Food Ministry. farmers generally sow sugarcane either as a mature India is staring at a second consecutive year of step bud shoots, or by extracting buds by a chipping surplus sugar production this season. Indian Sugar machine and sowing them directly in the soil. “The Mills Association has estimated the country’s sugar practice however requires massive quantity of buds output in 2018-19 at 31.5-32 million tonnes. and mature stems, one hectare requires 55 to 60 quintals of sugarcane sets, which needs heavy Though similar loans on last September were transportation cost. Whereas, the IGKV tissue culture facilitated to sugar mills, the industry since then has saplings are tried and tested and can be produced been making representations that this is not enough to cost-effectively at the local level.” alleviate the pain from depressed sugar prices and a supply glut in the system. This pressurize the Modi The tissue culture plants grown in the first year are government to introduce a huge relief package this meant to produce sets of sugarcane in their own field, time round, coincidently ahead of Elections. which can be used as a nursery to multiply the sugarcane sets. The farmer can harvest the sugarcane Besides helping the debt-ridden sugar companies in its second year of cultivation. with mills struggling to clear outstanding arrears to cane farmers, the relief package is also being seen as The tissue culture variety is disease resistant and one of the ways to reduce India’s capacity for crude fungus resistant. The tissue culture variety includes imports. Besides that, the agriculture ministry is nearly ₹1.50 lakh sugarcane species of code 86032 pitching the package as an environment friendly and 0265 and about 50 thousand tissue culture plants move. It believes the sops can enable sugar mills to of species B671 are available for sale. divert cane for the production of the eco-friendly ethanol. Reference: https://m.economictimes.com/news/economy/agriculture/ 4 FOOD SAFETY CONCERNS vegetables, sandwiches, and infant formula, among the other food items. INCREASE AS U.S GOVERNMENT www.ift.orgSHUTDOWN CONTINUES Gotlieb tweeted a week before that there were no questions that this approach has caused such an Manikandan R impact, and it was not business as usual. There was a very concerted effort to stand up critical functions On January 15, the U.S. Food and Drug and to focus on their consumer’s protection Administration (FDA) resumed some food safety mission, in many cases relying on expected inspections that had stopped since the government employees not being paid. shut down began on December 22, according to CNN. The inspectors back on the job were doing McHUGH NAMED DIRECTOR OF so without pay. USDA WESTERN RESEARCH Scott Gotlieb, FDA Commissioner, tweeted-on CENTER January 14 that they were restarting the high-risk Jeffrin J S food inspection. He also stated that they would do a compound inspection the following week. And The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s they started sampling high risk imported products Agricultural Research Service (USDA ARS) has in the north-east region that day. He also added named Tara McHugh centre Director for its that, they would expand their footprint as the week Western Regional Research Centre (WRRC). progresses. McHugh, who received her PhD from the Gotlieb said that the FDA were taking steps to University of the California - Davis in Food expand the scope of food safety surveillance Science, is an expert in innovative Food inspections that they were doing during the processing, edible films, and Nano science and a shutdown to make sure that they continue leader in high impact technology transfer. An IFT inspecting high risk food facilities. He noted that Fellow, McHugh is also the contributing editor of 31% of their inventory in domestic inspections Food Technology magazine, where she writes a were then resumed by the agencies which were monthly processing column. She has authored 150 applied to routine domestic surveillance peer-reviewed papers and patents, led 15 large inspections of foods which included seafood, grants, presented her research at more than 150 bakery products filled with custard, soft and scientific meetings, and has received many awards, semisoft ripened cheese and cheese products, including two USDA Secretary Honors Awards, unpasteurized juices, fresh and processed fruits and Arthur S. Flemming Award, and three Federal Laboratory Consortium Awards. Reference: www.ift.org 5 SWEETENER place shifts 1) The development Artificial Sweetener as a DEBATE?!?!?! Historical Window of second-generation sweeteners that improves the taste of the Artificial sweeteners products 2)The rise in popularity Sai Nisetha M Prabha M satisfy a craving but do of dieting and diet programs 3) The Cultural Extensification that The improved marketing and they come with a cost? enables Artificial Sweetener to branding practices in food Artificial sweeteners have shift, between 1950 and 1980 companies. from an unappealing adulterant been a tool to reduce to a desirable commodity from Today millions of calorie intake but Mayo people use artificial sweetener the perspective of a majority of clinic dietician Kate consumers all around the world. instead of nutritive sweetener in order to enhance their health. Zaretsky says research This is not to say that artificial First discovered in the late continues on how these sweeteners are healthy. They are th sweeteners affect appetite 19 century in the United States, in fact non-nutritive. They do Saccharin enabled individuals not contribute as how vitamins in one example. An experience sweet taste in food and proteins do. Yet artificial; Australian study recently with dramatic reductions in sweetener will be understood as revealed how the brain caloric consumption over “health foods” for two reasons. nutritive sweeteners. Between First, because those who make senses and integrates the 1890 and 1930 saccharin was the the decision to use them are sweetness and calories in only artificial sweetener largely motivated by the desire food and in that when we produced in the United States, to meet standardized metric of consume artificial and its consumption was limited the weight developed in the 20th to diabetics who eschewed sugar century and those metrics have sweeteners our brain gets for medical reasons. Beginning termed it “healthy”. And second the message that we ate in the 1950s with saccharin and from a cultural perspective, and something sweet yet it cyclamates, extending to food that consumers use in order aspartame in the early 1980s to pursue health as they doesn’t have any calories ,and now with sucralose , understand it should be to pair it and so we might chemical sweetener have found considered as healthy. Thus, in have a greater desire for a primary market among the spite of the non-nutritive, they consumers who could consume are valid site to look at the ways sweeter later on. nutritive sweeteners, but choose in which consumers have not to in order to lose weight. connected health and food in the This shift in consumer practices 20th century. can be linked to three market 6 What do researchers say? which tends to have least impact on us are xylitol and potentially erythritol. She also added that sweeteners Researchers from the university of Manitoba’s with high doses when consumed might end with some George and Fay Yee centre for health care innovation gastro intestinal issue. She even says that “our bodies centre in Canada found that non- nutritive sweetener make xylitol is found, erythritol too, a lesser degree may link to the risk of weight gain, a greater risk of naturally in fruits and vegetables. So again that’s high obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes and heart on our recommendation list. And coming to the non- diseases. nutritional sweetener which has no or low calorie Obesity is a public health challenge that affects more itself does not have impact on the blood sugar and than one third of the population across the country that’s been shown in multiple studies. For example, .Research showing that sugar consumption may fuel take Splenda, a lot of people consume Splenda but not the obesity epidemic has triggered the upsurge in all end up with problems in them. Maybe some popularity of non -nutritive sweeteners (artificial individuals might have problems but that depends on sweeteners) such as aspartame, stevioside and the adaptation of the individual. If it is in the liquid sucralose. In fact in 2008 more than 30 percent of form, I would say that it has no carbohydrates and no U.S.