An unprecedented series of crises has rendered the entire non-GMO lecithin market unbalanced, with shortages and price hikes never seen before. Flexibility of origin has become one of the most critical factors for ultimately securing availability.
At Sternchemie, it is our vision to be the strategic partner to the food industry for functional lipid solutions. Whether in times of shortage or for special demands, we want to make it easy for our customers to produce safe and healthy products. Accordingly, we’ve developed product solutions across the portfolio range and across all botanical origins.
With the current economic cooldown and some recipe adaptions, supply and demand appear to be in balance at present, even for sunflower and IP soy lecithins. But we consider this balance temporary and highly fragile. At least for 2023 and into 2024, NGM lecithin is expected to be in short supply on the European market. Good quality rapeseed lecithin is available but won’t be sufficient to compensate for the overall lack of sunflower. Over and above that, we anticipate a higher incidence of quality deviations due to improper handling and storage of raw materials.
Sternchemie strongly suggests testing rapeseed lecithin and approving it for use where possible, in order to gain flexibility and bridge the time until the situation has normalized again. With lecithins from Sternchemie, manufacturers can focus on their core business and on developing high-revenue, added value products. With our experts and support teams, we ensure that you keep up with the growing requirements in terms of workability, quality, functionality, and legal requirements.
