Sweeteners add sweetness to other substances or compounds. Their use is mainly intended to mask bad tastes, especially bitter tastes from plant origin or medications. We can divide sweeteners into natural or intensive. Regulation EU 1832/2003 only allows the use in piglets of natural sweeteners and, among the intensive, only saccharin and neohesperidin dihydrochalcone. As we all know the aftertaste of these two intense sweeteners is a drawback that may limit feed intake. Norel S.A. carried out a trial to assess the influence that saccharin aftertaste could have compared to Dulcoapetente D-6500, formulated with sodium saccharin, neohesperidin and flavoring substances to mask aftertaste. The trial tested a diet with 230 ppm of Dulcoapetente D-6500 versus a diet with 150 ppm of sodium saccharin (max. doses allowed in the EU) in piglets weaned at 21 days and with a basal diet containing amoxicillin 300ppm, colistin 200 ppm and zinc oxide 0,31%. The trial lasted 4 weeks. The obtained results showed a 6,5 % improvement on the weight gain in Dulcoapetente D-6500 piglets (15,73 kg vs. 14,76 kg in the saccharin treatment). Moreover, piglets that consumed the diet with Dulcoapetente D-6500 had an 11,5% higher ADG and a 3% better ADFI compared to the saccharin treatment. The feed conversion ratio was also improved by 8%. We can conclude that the product Dulcoapetente D-6500, containing flavoring ingredients to mask intense sweeteners aftertaste, can improve the productive parameters in weaned piglets.

Contact: Luis Mesas, lmesas@norel.net