I was recently at the 6th Queensland Food Safety Conference and there was a lot of discussion about additives and the concept of "clean" foods

The two major supermarkets are now including this concept in their auditing programs, which means that more and more manufacturers are moving their products in this direction.

"Clean" foods are those that contain few, if any, additves. It has come about due to the increasing general consumer push against additives in our foods. The ingredient list of these foods shows only foods and not the additives shown in our Food Standards Code.

The word "additive' has a very bad reputation but it is important that the public understand that without these "chemicals" many foods that we love would not exist today.

Ham and other cured products are not possible without some specific additives. To get the texture of some foods, specific thickeners and other additives must be included in the formulation  or recipe.

Do we consider the bacteria that is added to make cheese an additive?

Dried fruits, wine and other foods require specific additives to exist, so are all additives bad? The answer is NO.

Salt is effectively an additive in many foods, it is there for flavour and to assist with shelf-life. Across the world, there is a strong movement to reduce salt in our diets by cutting the amount of salt in processed foods.  To keep the same quality and shelf life, changes will need to be made to the formulations of those foods and this will potentially mean other additives.

People need to understand that additives are more than they seem and we need to work the whole issue through carefully without just simply saying No to them.