This poses an intriguing question: Have we survived millenia eating things that our bodies are ill-equipped to process? Could it be that the sweet treats that our mothers and our grandmothers so lovingly prepared were actually harmful to our health? Or, have our bodies, in some way, lost the ability to process sugar?
The answer lies in what we consume as sweet today: refined, crystallised, bleached white, sugar.
India has a longstanding tradition of growing sugarcane. While sugarcane may not be indigenous to India, its existence and its generous sweet gifts have been known to Indians for centuries. Alexander the Great, for instance, mentioned encountering what he referred to as “honey producing reeds” on his Indian adventure three hundred years before the birth of Christ! However, refined, industrially-produced sugar is a relatively new introduction to our diets. In fact, the industry was created during the British colonial era in the pursuit of shipping calories back to their motherland to fuel the industrial revolution. Unfortunately, in modern India, the practice of encouraging farmers to sell their sugarcane produce to mills that produce refined sugar continues.
What does this have to do with Indians’ new-found inability to process sugar? Jaggery or gud — the raw, unrefined sugar we were used to consuming for millennia—is a fundamentally different product from refined sugar. It consists of longer chains of sucrose that take longer time to digest, which means fewer sugar rushes, fewer sugar spikes. It is also rich in iron and other micronutrients that alter the character of the product and the body’ ability to process it.
Four individuals with varied tastes and backgrounds but united by a sweet tooth have come together on a mission to replace sugar from our diets, our recipes, our kitchen shelves, our lives.
It is the founders’ belief that refined sugar is the villain and not the sweet, innocent juice of the humble ganna (sugarcane). Towards that end, they are working with farmers, food technologists and chefs to develop jaggery-based sweet products that fit the modern on-the-go lifestyle of urban Indians.
The company’s flagship product —bite-sized candies made of jaggery along with traditional ingredients such as elaichi (cardamom), ginger, saunf (fennel), and haldi (turmeric) — have been on the market for a while and have made inroads into occasions dominated by sugared candies, chocolates, etc. Their popularity on online marketplaces and the promising repeat orders give the founders the confidence to take the next steps in the war against sugar.
The way ahead
Sugar is not just consumed as candy or chocolates but is also a key ingredient in several packaged food categories, including jams, ketchups, biscuits, to name just a few. To replace these sugar-based packaged food categories, Jaggic develops jaggery-based recipes,and will soon be launching products that are shelf-stable, tasty, and affordable.
Indians’ acceptance of the taste of gud and its health benefits are almost universal. The most significant challenge lies on the supply side. Unlike refined sugar, which uses industrial processes and chemicals to standardise the end product, quality jaggery requires expert handling from procurement to processing. There is also the additional complication of subsidies on refined sugar to deal with.
At Jaggic, the founders have spent over half a decade working with sugarcane farmers, developing jaggery production at farm-gate to the company's specifications as an alternative to the farmers selling their produce to sugar mills. It is their belief that this will stand them in good stead as they march forward in their war against sugar.
Sunday, 10 Dec, 2023
- Reform Push Laid Ground for India’s Robust Growth: PM
Prime Minister Narendra Modi asserted on Saturday that the priority given to policy, good governance and citizens’ welfare in the past decade has resulted in India becoming a robust economy with a GDP growing 7.7% in the last six months.IT Cos Take Pole Position on CEO Pay Front in India
The IT services industry continues to be the top CEO paymaster in India despite business headwinds in the past two years, going by FY23 numbers when seven out of the 10 highest earning CEOs in the country were from this sector.Discounts Reign with Early Yr-end Sales
Big discounting is making a comeback as brands and retailers including ecommerce platforms are advancing their end-of-season sale events by 7-10 days, in a rush to clear unsold inventories and notch-up revenue that remained under pressure for most part of the year.
Download The Economic Times News App to get Daily Market Updates & Live Business News.
- Gautam Adani details green elements of Rs 7 lakh cr investment planned across verticals
- "Historic day for Rajahmundry," says Scindia after laying foundation stone of airport's new terminal bulding
- Tata Motors to hike price of commercial vehicles by up to 3% from Jan 1, 2024
- Proposed US bill to charge fees from large apps should be adopted in India: COAI
- India's coal imports drop over 4% to 148 million in April-Octber period
- India's power consumption grows nearly 9 pc to 1,099.90 billion units in April-November
- Sony confident for double-digit growth journey in India, helped by premiumisation
- Mahindra’s Anish Shah takes over as FICCI President
- India’s plan for 50,000 e-buses on its roads gets US support
- Jubilant Agri and Consumer Products' CEO Manu Ahuja passes away