SA is poised to be a bellwether in the global fight against noncommunicable diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. Will Big Soda successfully make up for declining consumption of sugar drinks in North America and Europe by exploiting the South African market and other countries in Africa? Or will the government and community leaders be able to put in place a sugar-drink tax to provide needed revenues for vital health programmes and reduce consumption? The South African government has proposed a sugar-drink tax aimed at reducing obesity by reducing excessive sugar consumption. Smartly, it provides an incentive to industry to reformulate products by basing the tax on the sugar content of beverages. The more sugar, the higher the tax. READ THIS: Coke throws weight behind new ‘science’
Unfortunately, the soft-drink industry’s response has been all-out opposition, and two trends explain why. In the US, from 1998 to 2015, consumption of carbonated sugar drinks decli...
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