“Kera Vegetable Candy” contains undeclared sweetener Sorbitol

On the afternoon of March 20, regarding the food supplement product called “Kera vegetable candy” of the Sisters of the Basket Group Joint Stock Company (CER Group), in An Phu Ward (Thu Duc City, Ho Chi Minh City) and produced at ASIA LIFE Joint Stock Company (Nguyen Van Linh Street, Ea Tu Commune, Buon Ma Thuot City, Dak Lak Province) showing signs of violating food advertising regulations, the Food Safety Department (ATTP, Ministry of Health) announced the test results of this product.

Specifically, according to the test results of the National Institute for Food Safety and Hygiene, the product "Kera vegetable candy" has indicators on protein, sugar, fat, and total energy content that are basically consistent with the product's self-declaration.

Safety indicators for microorganisms, fungi, heavy metals... were not detected or were within safe limits. However, the institute discovered that the product contained Sorbitol - a sweetener with a content of 33.4g/100g, but was not listed on the product label as prescribed.

The Food Safety Department has sent an official dispatch to the Ho Chi Minh City Food Safety Department and Dak Lak Health Department requesting that violations be handled in accordance with regulations.

Recently, the product "Kera vegetable candy" has caused a stir in public opinion because of the advertising content on social networks with many famous people participating when mentioning that eating 1 candy is equivalent to a plate of vegetables. The online community also fiercely debated related to the quality and advertising of vegetable candy products on livestream sessions of social network accounts "Hang Du Muc" and "Quang Linh Vlogs".

The product is a collaboration between the Sisters Basket Group Joint Stock Company and the "Ken Rau" girl - Miss Nguyen Thuc Thuy Tien. Notably, a consumer posted a clip on social media saying that she had tested the "Kera vegetable candy" product, with the results showing that 30 pills (equivalent to 1 box) only had 0.51g of fiber.

Kera vegetable candy causes a stir in public opinion because of its advertising content

After the above noise, CER Group held a "press conference" in Hanoi in the form of "Friendly meeting with CER Group Team and the media" to provide information and clarify some issues related to the product "Kera vegetable candy".

However, this "press conference" was recorded by the Hanoi Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism in coordination with the People's Committee of Hoan Kiem District, the People's Committee of Trang Tien Ward and the Trang Tien Ward Police because it had not been licensed by the authorities.

NGUYEN QUOC