Can Canadians get the world consuming tree sap?

Whereas consuming tree sap doesn’t instantly sound interesting, Canadian producers are hoping that it is going to be the following must-try delicate drink all over the world.

We’ve all heard of maple syrup, which is made by boiling down the sap of maple bushes to provide a thick, candy, golden-to-brown colored syrup that’s sometimes poured over pancakes.

What is way much less well-known is which you could drink the sap itself, which is known as maple water. Clear in color, it comprises simply 2% pure sugars, so it’s only barely candy.

A small however rising variety of producers in Canada are actually promoting this maple water in bottles or cartons, after first giving it a filter and pasteurisation to kill off any microbes.

“Individuals really feel like they’re consuming the wild Canadian forest,” says Yannick Leclerc of Maple3, a producer of maple water drinks, based mostly in Quebec Metropolis.

Advocates level to the very fact it’s a pure drink, and makers hope that it may steal some gross sales from the present comparable product – coconut water. The latter is constituted of water that naturally kinds inside coconuts.

As Canada is way and away the world’s largest producer of maple syrup – accounting for greater than 80% of manufacturing – it’s comprehensible that the nascent maple water sector can also be Canadian. Moreover, it’s centred on the province of Quebec, which makes 90% of Canada’s maple syrup.

Mr Leclerc says that Maple3 is likely one of the pioneers of the sector. “No person [previously] considered retaining the sap for its hydration functions verses simply boiling it into syrup.”

He joined the corporate again in 2016, three years after it was based by his enterprise accomplice Stéphane Nolet. In recent times an rising variety of different producers have entered {the marketplace}.

Mr Leclerc claims that Maple3 has doubled its annual earnings since 2021, with gross sales not simply rising throughout Canada, however in 12 different international locations, together with France, Japan, Singapore and South Korea. Some 75% of its gross sales now come from abroad, and it sells each nonetheless and glowing maple water, and fizzy variations with added pure fruit flavourings.

“It is greater than only a native product at this level,” provides Mr Leclerc.

For the maple water trade as an entire, one current report predicts huge development. It estimated that world gross sales in 2024 totalled $506m (£409m), with that anticipated to leap to $2.6bn by 2033.

By comparability, worldwide gross sales of coconut water reached $7.7bn in 2023, with that anticipated to develop to $22.9bn by 2029. So maple water has a protracted approach to catch up.

In the meantime, the worldwide worth of the maple syrup market was $1.7bn final 12 months, in accordance with one examine.

Beth Czerwony, a dietician with the non-profit medical centre Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, says the rising recognition of maple water is linked to its perceived well being advantages.

“When the sap itself is filtered by means of the tree, it finally ends up absorbing a bunch of antioxidants,” she says. “In order that they’re gonna find yourself having a greater efficiency and a sooner exercise restoration.”

Nevertheless, one medical examine from 2019 concluded that maple water was “was not superior in rehydration” to regular water.

Jeremy Kinsella owns The Soda Pop Bros in Windsor Ontario, which sells delicate drinks below its personal model title, in addition to imports from all over the world.

His household have been within the trade for almost a century, and in his lifetime he has seen a fair proportion of developments come and go.

He says that if maple water is to go mainstream it wants the monetary backing and promotion of one of many enormous world delicate drinks corporations.

“It should take a bigger soda producer for it to essentially catch on,” he says.

Mr Kinsella additionally says that the worth of maple water is at present too excessive. “When it comes right down to it, somebody’s taking a look at a can of Coke for a buck and so they’re taking a look at a can of maple water for 3 bucks, they will strive it a few instances and return to Coke,” he says.

Advertising maple water extra would definitely assist it enhance gross sales, says John Tomory, who helps run Pefferlaw Creek Farms in Uxbridge, Ontario. He and his brothers have been making maple syrup commercially for nearly 10 years, and for the previous 4 they’ve additionally been promoting the sap to a Canada model known as Sap Sucker. This makes glowing sap water with totally different added flavours, from lime to grapefruit, and lemon to orange.

Mr Tomory says he agrees with this method to make the sap extra fascinating. “I do know lots of people have tried simply promoting the sap as it’s, simply fundamental sap from the tree and it is nonetheless, however they have not actually caught on,” he says.

“So I feel carbonating it and including fruit flavour makes it extra fascinating. That is the actual innovation.”

Again at Maple3 in Quebec, Mr Leclerc additionally thinks that the glowing model of the drink may very well be the extra fashionable: “It has perks {that a} regular glowing water would not have,” he says, similar to a extra fascinating flavour, with out having all of the unhealthy stuff that [regular] soda has.”