Russian manufacturers save on raw materials and food packaging

Food manufacturers save on raw materials and packaging. They are forced to take such measures in the face of declining purchasing power while increasing the cost of production.

According to a source close to the Rusprodsoyuz association of manufacturers and suppliers of food products, a number of tea producers are switching to cheaper raw materials and reducing the weight of the tea bag. Some manufacturers of chocolate products replace “grated cocoa” with “cocoa powder”, a cheaper by-product, and rapeseed or palm oil is used instead of cocoa butter.

Flour and other fillers were added to squash caviar, and starch was again used as a thickener in tomato paste.

Representatives of the canned food producer Pomidorprom said that in order to reduce the cost price for some of their products, they changed glass containers to cheaper packaging made of flexible materials.

The interlocutor of the publication from Rospotrebnadzor, in turn, acknowledged that over the past year the number of cases in which a cheaper product is issued for more expensive has sharply increased. The market was filled with fake food, he said, adding that butter is the leader here.