Anywhere I Hang My Tinfoil Hat…
I don’t actually have a tinfoil hat. I was commenting on my environmentally themed blog about Coca Cola’s big recycling announcement and I started researching HFCS. This lead me to stevia which lead me to the FDA which lead me to former White House dude Rumsfeld. It is amazing how much questionable business and politics surrounds the simple business of making food and drinks taste sweet.
In 1991, the FDA banned the natural low calorie sweetener stevia from being used as a food additive (it is allowed in diet supplements). It’s use is widespread and common elsewhere in the World. I was just double checking to make sure it was true that Diet Coke is sweetened with stevia in Japan and I found out what a small World we inhabit. My query for “stevia japan coca cola” had Jimmy Moore as the top hit. His post is more focused than my post. He details how some big business entities may be making a push to get stevia unbanned as a sweetener in the US. The comments that follow Jimmy’s post are quite illuminating. As an outsider, I have a bit of an approach avoidance issue with American politics.
This whole thing becomes hopelessly complicated when you factor in the fact that the biggest exporter of stevia is CHINA. Politics, economics, health and safety, human rights…there are a lot of issues wrapped around something as simple as a sweet tasting leaf.
