Unique Birch Water

Birch water is one of the world’s most sensitive naturally produced commodities, and only a few people manage its commercial production successfully.

The reason birch water is so sensitive and perishable, is that it is an exceptionally effective and fast growing medium for various microbes, bacteria, yeasts and moulds in the environment. These cause the juice to spoil – high microbial levels make the sap go cloudy and smell.

When the birch water is rising inside the tree, it is completely pure. As soon as it is tapped and reaches the outside, however, it is vulnerable to various microbes in the environment which readily multiply if given chance – the less time it is exposed to the outside, the less yeast, bacteria and mould can get in.

Special care must therefore be taken when collecting the unique and delicate birch water so that, at no stage of the industrial process, does it becomes contaminated.

How to Recognise High-Quality Birch Water?

When we talk about the quality of our birch water at Nordic Koivu, we mean how we maintain its pure organic quality. This dictates the way we organise everything in a production process where we test the quality at every stage.  

Consumers and experts in the beverage or cosmetics industry should consider the following when assessing the quality of birch water and how it is produced:

Where does birch sap actually come from – is it really pure? 

Several crucial factors are needed to commercially produce pure birch water: uncontaminated soil for the trees grow in; a means of keeping the highly susceptible birch water from getting contaminated; and monitoring of the birch water at every stage (from tapping the trees to arriving on the shelf) to check it remains uncontaminated.

birch water consists mainly of water, which the tree takes from the soil via its roots. If the soil is contaminated with heavy metals from industry, intensive agricultural methods, or a large nearby human population, it will naturally affect the purity of the birch water. When it is tapped and bottled, every care must be taken so that it is sealed off from the outside, and that all surfaces it comes into contact with are clean and do not contaminate the birch water with harmful microbes or spores from the environment. 

Nordic Koivu’s birch water is pure because of the unpolluted soils of Finland, the state-of-the-art collection system, and our unique quality control that allows us to monitor the progress of the birch water at every stage of the production process. This allows Nordic Koivu to trace each batch of birch water right back to the precise copse it comes from in Northern Karelia. This unique and trademarked system of collection has been carefully designed and streamlined to minimise the risk of contamination.

Is the Birch Water Organic?

birch water is best straight from the tree – when nothing extra is added. Nordic Koivu birch water is rare precisely because of its production with no sugar, no preservatives, no colouring nor artificial flavours being added. This means that Nordic Koivu birch water is exactly the same life-giving water that the birch itself uses to grow. 

Nordic Koivu birch water is certified as a naturally produced organic product that has been processed, transported, and stored in accordance with the strict conditions required by the EU for such a certificate. The birch trees and every stage of the production process are inspected and certified by a third party every year. The symbol of a green leaf on the Nordic Koivu packaging represents our birch water’s certified organic status.

How do we store the birch water?

The greater the delay between tapping the trees and storing it in clean sterilised containers, the greater the chance of the birch water spoiling. It is this susceptibility to microbial contamination that has long made storing birch water the biggest challenge in its commercial production.

Many operators solve this either by adding E-numbers or by freezing it to help preserve the birch water after tapping. However, both these methods risk significantly impairing the beneficial qualities of the birch water and can make it harder to be used in other commercial contexts.

We believe the best solution lies in a fast hygienic process and rigorous quality control. Nordic Koivu has been steadily developing this process over a long period, ensuring that the birch water remains the same as when it leaves the tree, without the need for additives or freezing which only temporarily stop the growth of harmful microbes.

Nordic Koivu Quality Control in Practice

Careful and detailed quality control ensures that at every single step of the way the risk of contamination is minimised and that Nordic Koivu birch water remains of the highest quality. Nordic Koivu has its own laboratory dedicated to measuring and monitoring the purity of the birch water at every step of the production process – from when the birch water is tapped to when it leaves our site for the customer, carefully packaged in sterilised bottles, cartons or containers.

Besides these internal quality control procedures, our company also sends samples of the birch water in each batch to external laboratories, from every stage of the production process, so they can also check the overall quality and composition of the birch water. Each batch is quarantined until the samples from that batch return from inspection.

As well as testing each batch, Nordic Koivu naturally ensures that all production facilities where the birch water is processed are clean and sterile. All work surfaces, production lines, and the air in our facilities are tested on a daily basis. The hygiene level of our staff is also monitored, e.g., by taking regular finger samples. 

Nordic Birch also requires a high level of hygiene from all its commercial suppliers. Only the very highest hygiene materials are selected for collecting, storing, and packaging the birch water, so that no microbes are transmitted.

Discover the High Quality Birch Water of Nordic Koivu!

Our efficient high-quality production process allows us to deliver birch water in large batches around the world. North Karelian birch water is used for a range of products in both the beverage and cosmetics industries, especially in Japanese, Chinese and Western and Central European markets. Most of the birch water produced by Nordic Koivu is exported abroad as a drink in bottles and cartons.