Soya milk

Description of product

Soya milk, which is mainly consumed in Asiatic countries, is produced primarily from soya beans and water. The soaked beans are ground to a paste and boiled. This separates the solid from the soluble components and yields a white, milk-like liquid. Soya drinks are also available, which consist of soya milk with added flavourings; however, these may not be designated as "milk".

Soya milk is usually enriched with calcium salts, vitamins and malt extract.

• Soya milk is the basis of different milk-substitute products: blancmange, desserts, whipping cream, crème fraiche or non-dairy creamer. For these, the traditional milk fraction is replaced by soya milk.
• See also: tofu, miso, soya sauce

Possible application of gene technology

Soya beans as raw material:

• Soya beans:Internationally traded primary product soya stems in general completely or in part from genetically modified plants. GM-soya beans are grown on a large scale in the USA, Argentina and Brazil. Each year the EU imports over 30 million tons of soya and soya primary products from these countries.
• Some food companies process exclusively conventional soya raw material. However, it is not technically possible to keep a strict separation of conventional and GM-soya beans through all the processing steps. Therefore, even raw materials that are declared as "free of gene technology" contain a small amount (possibly up to 0.9%) of genetically modified material.
• Traditional soya products such as soya milk are generally produced not from mass-produced soya but from soya beans with special attributes. These soya beans are cultivated and handled separately. Therefore, these products do not contain any appreciable amount of GM-soya beans.

Applications of gene technology are possible in the following ingredients that commonly are found in soya milk. However, the extent to which a particular product is affected by these possibilities cannot be stated with certainty:

• flavouring
• vitamins
• phytosterols in soya drinks with a cholesterol-lowering effect

Labelling: if soya milk is produced from genetically modified soya beans it has to be so labelled.