No more artificial flavors and colors in Butterfinger, Babe Ruth or any Nestle chocolate candies in the US, because Americans want them gone, the Swiss food giant said on Tuesday.
Nestle USA pledged to remove artificial flavors and government-certified colors from all its more than 250 products by the end of the year.
“We’re excited to be the first major US candy manufacturer to make this commitment,” Nestle USA Confections & Snacks president Doreen Ida said.
The unit of the world’s leading food company said its customer research on brands like Butterfinger showed US consumers prefer candy that is free of artificial flavors and colors.
The company also cited Nielsen’s 2014 Global Health & Wellness Survey, which found more than an 60 percent of Americans said the absence of artificial colors or flavors was important to their food purchase decisions.
Nestle USA said it would replace the artificial flavors, and colors certified as safe by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), with ingredients from natural sources.
For example, annato from the seed of the fruit from the achiote tree will replace Red 40 and Yellow 5 in Butterfinger’s crunchy center. Natural vanilla flavor will replace artificial vanillin in Crunch.
“We know that candy consumers are interested in broader food trends around fewer artificial ingredients. As we thought about what this means for our candy brands, our first step has been to remove artificial flavors and colors without affecting taste or increasing the price,” Nestle said.
The revamped products will begin appearing on store shelves by the middle of this year, labeled “No Artificial Flavors or Colors,” it said.
And all newly launched chocolate and non-chocolate candy products marketed by Nestle USA will be made without artificial flavors or colors, it pledged.
The company also said it is working on removing caramel coloring, used in nine of its chocolate products.
Caramel coloring, a common food coloring, is under scrutiny by consumer activists who say it may cause cancer.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in