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The Food and Drug Administration agreed in December that rebaudioside A, an extract from the leaves of the stevia plant, is safe to add to food and drinks. Stevia has one distinct advantage over all the rest. Because it comes from a plant, marketers can call it a natural sweetener. And that allows companies that have invested millions in new stevia products to tap into two powerful markets at once: natural ingredients and low-calorie products. Two of the biggest backers, Cargill and Whole Earth Sweetener Company, earlier this year began rolling out packets of stevia-based sweeteners, called Truvia and PureVia respectively. The extract is in the companies' drinks, too. Among the new stevia products marketed as naturally sweetened are Sprite Green from Coca-Cola and Trop50, from the PepsiCo subsidiary Tropicana. It's essentially half water and half orange juice doctored with stevia.

Welcome to SteviaInfo.com, a project dedicated to providing accurate and credible information about stevia, the all-natural, zero-calorie sweetener. Stevia Weight Loss RecipesProduced from a member of the daisy family, stevia is the world's only all-natural sweetener with zero calories, zero carbohydrates and a zero glycemic index. These attributes make stevia a good alternative to sugar or chemical sweeteners. Especially popular as a sweetener for coffees and teas, Stevia can also be used in cooking and baking, helping you reduce your calorie intake and stay healthy.

Stevia comes from an herb in the chrysanthemum family called Stevia rebaudiana. It is native to Paraguay, also grows in Brazil and Argentina, and is cultivated in China. The leaves have been used for centuries by native peoples to make sweet teas, or to sweeten other foods, with no evidence of harm. It is available in the United States, and the European Union as a dietary supplement and is sold here in whole-leaf form or as stevioside, the extracted sweet principle, sold as a granular white powder. The powder has very few calories but is so sweet that to use it, you must dissolve it in water, then dispense the solution by drops. A teaspoon of the liquid is equivalent in sweetness of a whole cup of sugar. Stevia is safe for diabetics and is widely used as a nonnutritive sweetener around the world.

Stevia is a genus of about 240 species of herbs and shrubs in the sunflower family (Asteraceae), native to subtropical and tropical South America and Central America. The species Stevia rebaudiana, commonly known as sweetleaf, sweet leaf, sugarleaf, or simply stevia, is widely grown for its sweet leaves. As a sweetener and sugar substitute, stevia's taste has a slower onset and longer duration than that of sugar, although some of its extracts may have a bitter or licorice-like aftertaste at high concentrations.

Family: Asteraceae Genus: Stevia Species: rebaudiana Synonyms: Eupatorium rebaudianum Common Names: Stevia, sweet leaf of Paraguay, caa-he-éé, kaa jheéé, ca-a-jhei, ca-a-yupi, azucacaa, eira-caa, capim doce, erva doce, sweet-herb, honey yerba, honeyleaf, yaa waan, candy leaf Part Used: Leaves

Stevia Sweetener is not only sweeter and healthier than sugar, but it is also better than other sugar substitutes. Stevia sweetener can be purchased as a leaf product or as a refined liquid or powder extract.

The Food and Drug Administration has declared a natural zero-calorie sweetener derived from the herb stevia safe for use in foods and beverages, clearing a path for Coca-Cola Co., PepsiCo Inc. and other companies to market it in a variety of products. Coke will introduce a reduced-calorie version of Sprite, called Sprite Green, and some Odwalla juice drinks with the new sweetener this month. Pepsi will launch three flavors of a zero-calorie SoBe Lifewater next week, and an orange-juice drink called Trop50, containing half the calories and sugar of orange juice, in March.