Britain’s Iceland Foods Ltd., has recently launched a wide range of chewing gums that are plastic-free, making the frozen food giant the UK’s first supermarket to offer a biodegradable alternative.

Reportedly, the local councils spend nearly £60m a year scraping gum off the pavements throughout the country. Britain is facing a losing battle with over 100,000 tons of chewing gum consumed yearly and an estimated 95% of streets trashed with the sticky substance.

However, the new natural alternative, Simply Gum is completely biodegradable making it beneficial for the environment. Sources familiar with the matter further reveal that the plastic substance often found in gum is replaced with chicle, a tree sap extracted from the sapodilla tree that is native to Central America.

Sources cite that the decision to stock the product, comes in the wake of Iceland’s vow to go plastic-free on its own label products, something the chain plans to accomplish by the end of 2023.

Following its announcement to launch the biodegradable chewing gum, Iceland carried out a research, which involved surveying 2,000 UK adults and revealed that more than 80% of adults were unaware of what chewing gum are made of. The report also claims that over 85% people don’t know that chewing gum contains plastic ingredients.

For decades, regular gum makers haven hidden their synthetic substance behind the catch-all term ‘gum base’ which is mentioned as an ingredient on the pack. Iceland is delighted to have the new biodegradable gum available to the UK consumers, so they have a choice about what they consume and how they choose to impact the environment, cite sources.

Of the 60% of Brits who consume chewing gum, two thirds would prefer a brand that doesn’t contain synthetic ingredients, reveal reports. More than three-quarters of buyers also said they would reconsider buying regular chewing gum in the future. Consequently, 85% of consumers in the UK think it’s every brand’s responsibility to specify what ingredients their products contain.