Chewing gums made with artificial ingredients are experiencing a global sales crisis. Natural chewing gum is presented as an alternative solution, certainly of interest from an environmental sustainability point of view. And why not, also for the possible health benefits associated with chewing. A beautiful production story Made in Italy, without chemicals and without excesses, following.
Chewing gum artificial, is it the end of an era?
After 150 years since the registration in the USA of the first chewing gum patent, data of the sector crisis are noted. (1) Sales of Chewing gum have fallen globally (-4%), literally collapsed in the United States (-23%). (2) Analysts do not seem able – or do not have the courage – to explain the phenomenon that the trade press seems inclined not to highlight.
Some hypothesize that the drop in sales is due to consumers' distraction at the registers and checkouts, absorbed in consulting the smartphone instead of looking at the products for sale. But it is hard to believe that this is the cause of a radical change in the daily habits of wide segments of the population. A more plausible hypothesis is that the act of chewing is considered naïve, socially inappropriate. And above all that attention is increasing towards possible risks related to food consumption.
Artificial gums, what is disliked
In the golden times of the ‘Bridge gum’, the most colorful urban legends fueled the imagination of children and teenagers. The most widespread, albeit ridiculous, involved Big Babol, rumored to be made with seal or whale fat. And they were widely consumed.
In recent years Attention has instead focused on food additives – one above all, titanium dioxide (E171) – and more generally, on synthetic ingredients and flavors. The very base gum used in most Chewing gum artificial, according to the French magazine Nourrir demain, would be made in the laboratory.
The aforementioned magazine reports the presence in chewing gums of ‘many chemical components such as lithium (used in batteries) or polyvinyl acetate which is generally found in glues or paints. A synthetic polymer alloy which, after cigarette butts, is the second most produced waste in the world. And since its chemical structure is insoluble, non-biodegradable and acid-resistant, it is estimated that it takes about 5 years for a chewing gum to completely disintegrate. With a considerable economic cost, borne by the community, to clean the sidewalks’.
The chewing gum natural
The chewing gum natural seems destined to find at least some space in this struggling sector. Even if it is not easy for new operators to enter a market controlled and dominated by a few giants. Its first distinctive element is the use of natural gum, processed with traditional techniques from Central America. Thus proposing the sustainable consumption of a product useful to improve attention, as well as to ‘refresh breath’. (3)
The base material is the chicle, the natural gum extracted from the Sapodilla tree by harvesting from its trunk without harming the health of the plant. A fully biodegradable substance that degrades in a few weeks, instead of 5 years like its synthetic counterpart.
Natural ingredients to chew
Additional ingredients, necessary to make chewing natural gum pleasant, are simple and themselves – at least in part – natural. At least natural flavors and safe sweeteners. Xylitol and stevia primarily, effective and free from risks associated with the consumption of synthetic sweeteners, as already noted for acesulfame K.
Xylitol (E 967) is one of the 'bulk sweeteners' or polyols widely used by the food industry. For chewing gums sweetened with xylitol, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has approved the use of the health claim 'it helps reduce dental plaque', however, with a consumption of at least 2-3 chewing gum per day. (4) Excessive consumption (over 50 g, 20 in children) of this sweetener, however, is associated with diarrhea and other gastrointestinal disorders, even to a greater risk of tumor occurrence.
Stevia – with a sweetening power 150 to 250 times higher than sugar (sucrose) and without calories – is the other sweetener used in chewing gum natural products. A marvel of nature shaken by the specters of the giants of biotech, already working on the development of its GMO variants.
The market of chewing gum natural products
The new chewing gum natural products are now available with relative ease. The news from a few days ago is about the launch of the French TooGood, which also produces snack and cookies without any additives.
NaturGum is instead the chewing gum natural Made in Italy, conceived by two Italians following a trip to Mexico (where the rubber tree grows) and produced in Bolzano, in mint and wild berry flavors.
Marta Strinati and Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) See https://www.greenme.it/mangiare/altri-alimenti/chewing-gum-compie-150-anni/
(2) See Euromonitor International
(3) The chewing of chewing gum is associated with an improvement in cognitive functions and particularly attention. See the review by Japanese researchers Yoshiyuki Hirano and Minoru Onozuka, Chewing and Attention: A Positive Effect on Sustained Attention, BioMed Research International, vol. 2015, Article ID 367026, 6 pages, 2015. https://doi.org/10.1155/2015/367026
(4) See https://efsa.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.2903/j.efsa.2011.2266
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT – Food Times) and Égalité.
Professional journalist since January 1995, she has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and magazines (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). Author of investigative reports on food, she published the book 'Reading labels to know what we eat'.
