Organic release agents fulfill urgent market need, Sonneveld
According to the Dutch group, many bakery licensees have been finding it impossible to meet the Soil Association standard on the use of organic release agents because there had been none available on the market that met the technical requirements of many bakeries.
The UK organic body aims to eliminate the use of non-organic processing aids from organic bakery and food production wherever possible.
The bakery ingredients supplier said its new release agent, Bio Release, along with a new dividing and cutting oil, Bio Division 75, are produced using organic sunflower oil, are 100 per cent vegetable based and contain no additives to meet organic and clean label demands.
Efficient bread removal
Releases agents are designed to enable bread and pastry products to be removed, without damage, from pans, sheets or oven bands, while dividing and cutting oils ensure no small particles remain on slicing knives when dough is being transferred to tins from the mixing stage. They are traditionally sourced from standard linseed, rapeseed or palm oil.
A Sonneveld spokesperson said that: “While the organic bakery segment is certainly not our largest market, we aim to be as comprehensive in our offering as we can, and there are sufficiently large organic bakery players all over Europe to warrant investment in this kind of R&D.
We also provide organic mixes and envisage growth in the organic bakery segment, particularly in Spain.”
She told BakeryandSnacks.com that the new organic products will be priced at a premium in light of the cost margins involved in organic ingredient sourcing and that currently the are only organic release agents on the market that fulfil the needs of speciality bread and pastry manufacturers.
The supplier’s release agents, maintains the spokesperson, can help speed production, reduce carbonisation, extend the life of baking equipment and also facilitate cleaning.
Organic bakery market
Sales of organic bread and bakery items experienced a significant plunge in sales in the UK in 2009, according to the Soil Association's Organic Market Report published in April.
The organic standards body estimates that bread and bakery sales in multiple retail outlets were worth £40.7m in 2009 – down nearly 40 per cent on the previous year.
The publication, which reports that bread and other bakery products account for three per cent of organic food brought back to the home, also shows that organic biscuit sales fell by 19 per cent, while organic breakfast cereal sales declined by nine per cent during 2009.
The Association maintains that bread sales were hit by a combination of the economic downturn and problems with variable product quality, and it states that a key concern for 2010 is the uncertain availability of organic flour and other ingredients following on from the negative impact of a wet summer on the 2009 harvest.
And the report stresses that artisan bakers are producing high-quality organic products that continue to command strong support from a core of committed consumers, and it argues that argues that industry backing is needed to maintain the confidence of organic farmers in continuing to invest in and produce organic cereals.
