Cailiannews (Nanjing, reporter Zha Daokun Jia Xiaoning) news, with the improvement of people's living standards, more and more attention to healthy diet, some unhealthy eating habits, people have begun to wipe sleep, and seek to change, among which sugar reduction is especially attached importance.

On July 15, The State Council officially released the "Healthy China 2019-2030" development plan, which encourages the whole society to "reduce oil, salt and sugar" and promote the construction of food nutrition standard system.

Thus, sugar reduction was again elevated to an important position. Therefore, to substitute sugar food industry to open up unlimited industrial imagination. According to Caixin reporters, the world's leading fine chemical Jinhe Industry (002597.SZ) launched a new sugar substitute product - "Philharmonic sweet", which has become the current sugar substitute product industry focus of attention, but also the focus of public opinion recently.

It is worth noting that the supplier of sweetener raw materials used to develop new products from the B end to the C end, how to position Philharmonic sweet, how to let the market more recognized Philharmonic sweet, how much space in the future market? With these questions, Cailianhe reporters interviewed Yang Le, chairman of Jinhe Industry. He told CaiAP that sugar substitute will become a trend in the future, whether it is required by national policies or people's health needs. According to the requirements of the national health plan, sugar products will replace half of the domestic sugar use in the next 10 years, and the market is huge.

Sugar reduction is urgent

According to the "Healthy China 2019-2030" development plan, we put forward reasonable dietary actions, focusing on encouraging the whole society to reduce salt, oil and sugar. By 2030, we advocate that per capita daily salt intake should be no more than 5g, per capita daily edible oil intake should be no more than 25-30g and per capita daily added sugar intake should be no more than 25g.

However, the current per capita intake in our country is far higher than the above standards. Ding Gangqiang, director of the Nutrition and Health Institute of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said at a news conference of the National Health Commission on July 17 that a 2012 survey showed that the average daily intake of salt and edible oil was 10.5g, and the average daily intake of added sugar (mainly sucrose) was about 30g. All of them are higher than the intake recommended by the World Health Organization and the Dietary Guidelines for Chinese Residents.

From the above documents, we can see that there is no time to delay in promoting sugar reduction, which also provides an unlimited market for sugar substitute products. According to Caixin reporters, the world sucralose, acesulfamil and maltose sweeteners such as the largest production enterprise Jinhe Industry has launched a new sugar substitute product.

According to CaiAP reporters, philharmonic sweet is a matching sugar substitute product, which is a combination of new artificial sweetener and natural nutritional sweetener. The main raw materials are erythritol, stevia and sucralose.

As for the reason behind the new product, Yang Le told Caixin that sugar substitute is widely used in foreign markets. In American restaurants and cafes, small bags of sugar-substitute products can be found everywhere. Different packaging colors correspond to different sweeteners, including xylitol, stevia, and abastian. Now the consumer education and cognition of sweeteners in the United States has been very common, and the American sugar substitute C end market is also relatively developed. However, there is almost a blank in the C-end substitute sugar market in China at present. Jinhe Industry saw such a market opportunity and founded the product of Philharmonic Sweet.

It is worth noting that at present, the incidence of obesity and diabetes in China continues to rise, which are related to the high intake of sugar. According to incomplete statistics, there are more than 100 million people with diabetes in China, and if the use of sugar substitute products, no sugar and fat, calories are 0, then diabetic patients can feel at ease to eat sugar. In addition, consumers will greatly reduce the risk of diseases caused by excessive sugar intake, so reducing sugar intake and consuming healthier sugar products is an important choice for consumers at present.

"How can China's 1.3 billion consumers, in every consumption scenario in their daily lives, have the convenience and the right to freely choose sugar-free products and get the healthiest sweet?" Yang Le told Caixin. I think the first thing we need is a sugar substitute product like Philharmonic, so that they know more about sugar substitute products."

In addition, Yang told Cailian.com that the formula of the product has been adjusted more than 1,000 times from version 1.0 to version 2.0 in order to make it more palatable to consumers who lack awareness of sugar substitute products. The 2.0 version of Philharmonic sweet has achieved a 1:1 ratio of sweetness with sucrose, allowing users to get the same sweetness without changing the habit of added sugar. "Now Philharmonic consumers are mostly concentrated in first - and second-tier cities, and college girls are the largest group of consumers."

Sugar substitute products are in their infancy

According to Cailin.com reporters understand, at present, like Philharmonic sweet, there are also some sugar substitute products in China, but they are in the initial stage, and there is no real leading enterprise in the industry.

In this regard, Yang Le told Cailiannews reporters that similar products in the industry and no secret, "from the production point of view, is to use a single generation of sugar products in proportion to the configuration. So companies only need to study the formula, and then buy raw materials for other companies to OEM and label, can become their own sugar substitute brand."

In Yang Le's opinion, the whole sugar substitute retail industry is basically a blank at present. Some foreign sugar substitute retail products can only be found on the e-commerce platform, failing to directly enter the domestic market. Other domestic manufacturers of similar products have a few, but the scale is not large, from the strength of the Jinhe industrial gap is relatively large.

According to the annual report, Jinhe Industry in 2018 operating revenue of 4.132 billion yuan, listed company shareholders profit 9.11 million yuan, withholding non-net profit of 847 million yuan. And the first half of 2019 performance forecast, Jinhe industry is expected to profit 390 million to 420 million yuan.

With professional research and development team and deep financial support from listed companies, Philharmonic Sweet hopes to become an explorer in the industry. However, with the gradual expansion of the future market, it is inevitable that more and more enterprises will enter the sugar substitute market to compete for market share.

In this regard, Yang Le told Cailian reporters that Philharmonic sweet finally in the C end of the market positioning, is high-end seasoning products, since in the C end, it is impossible to do only one, "a number of enterprises in the industry competition, survival of the fittest, is conducive to the development of the entire industry. As for potential competitors in the future industry, we have confidence, because now entering this industry are small enterprises, their overall strength is average, the product is difficult to be guaranteed, and we have this strength. There will be stronger players coming into the industry in the future, but we have been on the track for a while, so we are confident about our future competitors."

In Yang Le's opinion, the future competitor is likely to be condiment enterprises. First of all, sugar enterprises can not self-destruct the Great Wall, research and development of sugar substitute products sales; The sugar substitute production enterprises, however, are more oriented to B-end enterprise customers, and are constrained by production pressure and customer base, so it is very unlikely to enter C-end. "From the current situation, it is expected that some powerful condiment enterprises, especially listed companies, will enter the field of sugar substitute in the future. They have the advantage of capital and consumption channels, the future sugar substitute market is gradually expanding, condiment enterprises are likely to rush in to take a share of the action."

The future market is huge

According to the planning at the national level, the sugar substitute industry is undoubtedly facing a huge market in the future, which also brings opportunities for sugar substitute products.

So how big is the potential market for splenda? According to the national policy, the average person in China should consume no more than 25 grams of sugar per day by 2030, compared with 50 to 60 grams at present. If the policy becomes stricter and people are not willing to change their sugar consumption rules, then the consumption of white granulated sugar will be shifted to substitute sugar consumption.

"If the market drops from 50 grams per person to 25 grams per day, half of the sugar market will be replaced by sugar substitute. Based on the current domestic consumption, the consumption of sugar substitute will be equivalent to 10 million tons of sugar per year, which is a big blue ocean." Yang Le told Cailiannews reporters, "At present, Phila Sweet beach sugar substitute market, as long as the future can occupy 10% of the sugar substitute market share, that is very good achievement."

It is worth noting that although the national level to increase the efforts to reduce sugar, but people have been used to the use of white sugar, how to let consumers from white sugar to sugar substitute products, is placed in front of the most realistic problem including Jinhe Industry sugar substitute products production enterprises.

In this regard, Yang Le told Cailian reporters that as a C-end product, the future consumption scene in addition to directly added to tea or coffee, may be more often used to cook dishes, such as braised fish, braised meat; But for the average consumer, how to use splenda proportionally is a problem. Therefore, the 2.0 version of philharmonic sweet and white sugar sweetness 1:1 ratio, is to take into account consumer consumption habits.

In order to change consumer perception, Jinhe industry sales people also want to a lot of methods, especially offline promotion. In the future, philharmonic sweet will appear in the dining tables of five-star hotels, together with sugar products as a consumption choice, exquisite packaging, to play a role in brand publicity. Secondly, it will strengthen the cooperation with Luckin, Naisei, Mairon, Seesaw and other domestic first-line fine coffee and tea drink channels.

"Our current consumer group is mainly young people who like to try new things and have a high consumption preference. As we improve the level of consumer education and young people who have used our products in the past mature, sugar replacement products will become more popular in the future. If we do that, as a C-end brand, Alosweet will be successful, and the sugar substitute industry will be successful." Yang Le told Caixin reporter said.