THE CUBA REVIEW 



29 



THE SUGAR INDUSTRY 



SUGAR SUBSTITUTES 



Warning has recently been issued, from 

 Washington by the Bureau of Chemistry 

 of the Department of Agriculture to the 

 effect that substitutes 'for sugar in 

 canned goods or other forms of prepared 

 foodstutfs put up by manufacturers must 

 be declared on the labels of the packages 

 if the goods are to enter into inter- 

 state commerce. Officials of this bureau 

 are charged, with the enforcement of the 

 Federal Food and Drugs Act, governing 

 food substitutes and adulterants. 



Under the act, says our contemporary, 

 Facts About Sugar, which applies to all 

 products carried in interstate commerce, 

 only substitutions which are harmless are 

 permitted in foods, and those that are 

 permitted should be clearly indicated, 

 when used. 



The object of the regulation requiring 

 that substitutes be declared on the labels 

 of the packages is not to limit the use 

 of wholesale substitutes, officials of the 

 bureau point out, but to let consumers 

 know what they are getting. A purchaser 

 of a food product in which sugar, for ex- 

 ample, is a normal ingredient, will nat- 

 urally expect to get sugar in that product 

 unless advised that a substitute has been 

 used in the particular article which he 

 is buying. 



Again, as substitutes are usually 

 cheaper than the ingredient which they 

 are used to replace, it is only fair that a 

 distinction be made on the labels be- 

 tween foods that contain all the normal 

 ingredients and foods in which one or 

 more of them are replaced by a cheaper 

 substance. 



With respect to sugar, it is pointed out 

 that there are a number of substitutes 

 which may properly be used in manufac- 

 tured foods, such as jams, jellies, marma- 

 lades, soda waters, confections, and the 

 like, as long as their use is plainly indi- 

 cated for the information of the buyer. 

 Among these mention is made of malt 

 sugar syrup, glucose, corn sugar, corn 

 syrup, honey, and high grade refiners' 



syrup. As, however, these substitutes do 

 not possess the same food value as sugar, 

 it would not be fair practice to permit 

 their use without declaring it on the 

 label. 



There is one product which has been 

 widely advertised by its manufacturers 

 as a sugar substitute, use of which for 

 this purpose is not legally permissible. 

 This is the familiar coal-tar product 

 saccharin. Saccharin has been held not 

 a proper or legal substitute, since it is 

 declared by authorities to be injurious 

 to health, while, having no food value 

 whatever of its own, it lowers the quality 

 of any product in which it is used to re- 

 place sugar, which has a high food value. 



The use of saccharin, whether declared 

 or not, is therefore prohibited under the 

 Federal Food and Drug Act, as well as 

 by the laws and regulations of most of 

 the states. A number of food manufac- 

 turers have been convicted for shipping 

 into interstate commerce foods adulter- 

 ated with saccharin, and a criminal prose- 

 cution is now pending against a manu- 

 facturer of saccharin for shipping it 

 labelled as harmless. 



The Government officials strongly em- 

 phasize the point that even those foods 

 in which harmless substitutes are used 

 are subject to seizure and the persons re- 

 sponsible to prosecution If they are 

 shipped without being labelled. 



PURCHASE OF SUGAR MILL BY 

 GEORGE W, LOFT 



Former Congressman George W. Loft, 

 candy manufacturer of New York, has 

 purchased the Dulce Nombre Sugar Cen- 

 tral, located at Macogua, province of Mat- 

 anzas, which hereafter will be known as 

 the Loft Central. Purchase price is said 

 to have been between $2,500,000 and $3,- 

 000,000. 



The new oAvner intends to have the 

 Central's output, which is now about 60,- 

 000 bags yearly, washed and clarified at 

 the Central instead of in the United 

 States, as has been done formerly. 



