Two years of crisis. Sanctions. Currency fluctuations. The exit of transnational companies. All this time the confectionery market has literally had a hard time. How is the industry developing today? What innovations can ingredient producers offer to it? These and other questions were discussed by experts and technologists at the EFKO Group seminar.
The difficult geopolitical situation hit the confectionery market hardest. Producers faced a shortage of raw materials, and due to problems with importing ingredients, production costs rose.
However, the statistics speak for themselves. According to Rosstat, in 2023 the production of confectionery in our country increased by 3.5% compared to 2022 and amounted to 4.1 million tons — the highest figure since 2018. Half of the volume is the sugar segment, they produced 2.1 million tons, the remaining 2 million tons are flour confectionery products.
The market has not only adapted to the difficulties, but is moving forward with confidence. This is largely due to the fact that the domestic fats and oils industry has been able to fully replace imported foreign ingredients. Today, EFKO's capacities, technologies and equipment enable it to meet the needs of the country's leading companies in the field of specially fats and other food ingredients.
What innovations can we offer to producers?
One of the main requests is for cocoa butter alternatives.
Cocoa butter is a key ingredient in many confectionery products. But it is an expensive and limited product — often there is simply a physical shortage. That is why the confectionery industry uses its alternatives. Our company was the first in Russia to develop a cocoa butter equivalent — it is as close as possible to cocoa butter in composition and properties, but has a higher crystallization rate and increased resistance to recrystallization.
“Cocoa butter equivalent is widely used in chocolate compounds both in Russia and abroad," says Evgenia Potekina, EFKO Group technologist. — It is used not only in classic recipes, but also in the creation of new confectionery products. It is worth mentioning that the production of equivalents itself is a complex, time-consuming process that requires special equipment and raw material base. Today we produce a wide range of equivalents: universal, for hard and soft chocolate compounds and for praline masses. Our range also includes a cocoa butter improver that increases the bloom resistance of chocolate”.
This year we introduced another cocoa butter alternative to the market — substitutes of mixed type. These are fundamentally new ingredients — they are used in the production of various types of confectionery products and compounds. Cocoa butter substitutes of mixed type combine all the benefits of lauric and non-lauric cocoa butter substitutes. At the same time, they make it possible to make products with a minimum content of trans-isomers — less than 2%.
A new product for the market, which has already won the Best Product award at Prodexpo-2024, is confectionery fats “Econat” with shea butter. The oil is obtained from the fruit of a tree that grows in West and Central Africa. Locals have used it in traditional cuisine for centuries — it has a creamy consistency and delicate nutty flavor. But the world learned about the “African miracle” only in the XIX century due to the development of trade.
We have learned how to fractionate shea butter and use these fractions to create unique compositions that reveal the flavor of fillings in confections such as assorted candies, pralines and pastes.
Today's confectionery market demands a wide range of ingredients. First of all, crystallizers, which prevent the separation and migration of liquid oils and allow to obtain the desired consistency of the product.
“For a long time, crystallizers were imported from other countries," says Alyona Surkova, Director of the Confectionery Department in the Oils and Fats Division of the EFKO Group. — We have developed our own product, which allows us to expand the range of chocolate-nut, peanut and khalva pastes. We have also developed a line of emulsifiers and started their pilot production. The confectionery industry accounts for 49% of the consumption of these ingredients. Emulsifiers are used in the production of confectionery masses — fillings for enrobed candies, truffles and pralines, chocolate, chocolate and confectionery compounds, as well as flour confectionery products”.
We not only discussed ingredients with our partners, but also tasted products based on them. We tried candies and wafers with nut fillings and with our confectionary fat with shea butter fractions, crunchy chocolate-covered cookies with cocoa butter equivalents, and more.