Currently browsing posts about: Soft drinks

We have Healthy Food America and the University of Washington, the UCONN Rudd Center for Food Policy & Health, and the Public Health Law Center at Mitchell Hamline School of Law to thank for this guide to tax legislation that will promote health and racial equity.

The report:

• Reviews tax laws proposed and achieved in the US
• Summarizes the experience of advocates and policymakers
• Examines approaches used in alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis taxes
• Recommends how to draft legislation to promote equity

The full report: Investing Sweetened Beverage Tax Revenues to Advance Equity: Recommendations for Drafting Legislation

The brief report is here.

An infographic provides a quick overview.

Other supporting materials are available on the Healthy Food America website.

Want to give this a try?  Here’s how.

Here’s a report from the World Health Organization on the effects of taxing sugar-sweetened beverages.

The study:

Consumption of SSBs is associated with increased risk of overweight and obesity (5), cardiovascular events (6), hypertension (7) and diabetes (8). There is now substantial evidence that SSB taxes can both discourage consumption and encourage reformulation (9,10). SSB taxes have also been found to have positive impacts on population weight and to potentially have greater health benefits among lower socioeconomic populations (11,12)….This study takes a policy analysis lens to studying SSB tax adoption and implementation in the WHO European Region. The focus was on the politicoeconomic and stakeholder dynamics in cross-sectoral policy-making, as well as considering adaptation in policy design.

https://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/disease-prevention/nutrition/publications/2022/sugar-sweetened-beverage-taxes-in-the-who-european-region-success-through-lessons-learned-and-challenges-faced-2022

https://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/disease-prevention/nutrition/publications/2022/sugar-sweetened-beverage-taxes-in-the-who-european-region-success-through-lessons-learned-and-challenges-faced-2022

• Be adapted to a country’s legislative, fiscal, economic and health context.
• Be designed and implemented through collaboration between finance and health policy-makers.
• Take revenues into consideration.
• Expect opposition from industry.

On this last point, the report says:

SSB taxes were strongly opposed by actors in the food and beverage industry in all the study countries, before and after  implementation. Industry made strong public statements regarding the negative economic impact that the tax would have on industry, particularly in relation to employment. In Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland and Portugal, they also argued that the tax would be regressive and, therefore, have a negative impact on consumers. In Belgium, Finland, France and Hungary (notably, these were earlier taxes), industry actors raised concerns that the tax singled out beverages and/or the beverage industry for differential taxation. Industry actors also presented a range of arguments regarding the taxes being ineffective and poorly designed.

Soda tax advocates need strategies to counter this opposition.  Plenty are available.  See the toolkit at Healthy Food America, for example.

As if we don’t have enough trouble with alcohol in this country, it’s now being added to sodas.  In states that allow such things, expect to see them taking up more and more room in supermarket aisles.

The business press is interested in this trend; there is much money to be made on drinks of any kind.

See, for example, Bud Light to Launch Hard Soda.

Bud Light Seltzer Hard Soda will have no sugar or caffeine. Anheuser-Busch describes it as ‘light like a seltzer and bold like soda pop.’ Each can will contain 100 calories and 5% alcohol.

This comes in cola, cherry cola, orange and lemon-lime flavors.

Consumer demand has soared over the past few years for nonalcoholic seltzers such as LaCroix and alcoholic ones such as White Claw that are low on calories and offer just a hint of flavor. Now some consumers are migrating toward stronger flavors, industry experts say, and brewers are trying out new fizzy drinks.

This, then, is about market share.

Lots of other companies are getting into this act.

• From Beer to Hard Seltzer: A Cultural Pivot Finds a New Market:  Boston Beer Co., owner of popular brands like Sam Adams and Dogfish Head, launched its hard seltzer Truly in 2016. CEO Dave Burwick explains the company’s cultural pivot that made it No. 2 in the rapidly growing category.
• No- and low-alcohol category value in key global markets nears $10bn.  Monster enters alcohol category with CANarchy Craft Brewery Collective acquisition:  Monster Beverage Corporation will acquire CANarchy Craft Brewery Collective LLC, a craft beer and hard seltzer company for $330m, providing a springboard for the energy drink giant into the alcoholic beverage category…. Read more
• Coca-Cola, Molson Coors to partner on Simply Spiked Lemonade.  The RTD alcoholic beverage, which is set to hit shelves this summer, is the second drink to be developed by the two companies, following the launch of Topo Chico Hard Seltzer in 2021.
• Dry January movement grows presenting opportunity for non-alcoholic beverage brands:  Many consumers are reporting to take part in Dry January by either abstaining completely or significantly cutting down (‘Damp January’) on their alcohol consumption for the month, presenting year-long opportunities for the non-alcoholic beverage brands, says Morning Consult…. Read more

Given all that, what are we to make of this piece of news?

• Alcohol and COVID-19: Good news for red wine drinkers, but blow for beer boozers?  People who consume red wine between one to more than five glasses a week had a 10 to 17% lower risk in contracting COVID-19, but beer drinkers had a heightened risk, according to a recent study…. Read more
• Here’s the study: COVID-19 Risk Appears to Vary Across Different Alcoholic Beverages.
• Here’s the caveat: Association does not equal causation.  Drinkers of red wine have different lifestyles than beer drinkers, perhaps?
• And here are the study’s sensible conclusions:  The COVID-19 risk appears to vary across different alcoholic beverage subtypes, frequency, and amount…Consumption of beer and cider and spirits and heavy drinking are not recommended during the epidemics. Public health guidance should focus on reducing the risk of COVID-19 by advocating healthy lifestyle habits and preferential policies among consumers of beer and cider and spirits.

Amen.

I received a notification of the output of a research team at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), which did an evaluation of local soda taxes. Its products and resources are available at UIC Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center (P3RC).

Among these are research briefs summarizing the available evidence base of U.S. sweetened beverage tax studies.

1. Chriqui JF, Pipito AA, Asada Y, Powell LM. Lessons learned from the adoption and implementation of sweetened beverage taxes in the United States: A narrative review. Research Brief No. 119. Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center, University of Illinois Chicago. Chicago, IL. June 2021.
2. Powell LM, Marinello S, Leider J. A Review and Meta-analysis of Tax Pass-through of Local Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Taxes in the United States. Research Brief No. 120. Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center, University of Illinois Chicago. Chicago, IL. July 2021.
3. Powell LM, Marinello S, Leider J, Andreyeva T. A Review and Meta-analysis of the Impact of Local U.S. Sugar-sweetened Beverage Taxes on Demand. Research Brief No. 121. Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center, University of Illinois Chicago. Chicago, IL. August 2021.
4. Marinello S, Powell LM. A Review of the Labor Market Impacts of Local Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Taxes in the United States. Research Brief No. 122. Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center, University of Illinois Chicago. Chicago, IL. September 2021.
5. Leider J, Oddo VM, Powell LM. A Review of the Effects of U.S. Local Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Taxes on Substitution to Untaxed Beverages and Food Items. Research Brief No. 123. Policy, Practice and Prevention Research Center, University of Illinois Chicago. Chicago, IL. November 2021.

An excellent source of information about soda taxes is available at Healthy Food America

• Research Watch
• Soda tax toolkit
• Compare tax policies
• Map the movement
• Publications

And let’s not forget the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO)’s terrific report on soda taxes in Latin America.

I am happy to see that USDA’s Economic Research Service is back on the job and recovering somewhat from its forced move to Kansas City.  I was especially interested to see this report: U.S. Food-Related Water Use Varies by Food Category, Supply Chain Stage, and Dietary Pattern.

It has three main conclusions:

• The U.S. food system, which provides the majority of domestically purchased foods and beverages, requires about one-third of the Nation’s total freshwater use.

• Crop production uses over half of the water for food, while later supply chain stages also require a substantial amount of water.

• Freshwater usage varies by the food categories that make up U.S. diets. If the U.S. population were to adopt healthier dietary patterns, food-system water use could substantially increase or decrease, depending on the dietary patterns realized.

Something to consider.  But all this is why PepsiCo is making such a big point about trying to reduce its water use (it takes many gallons of water to make one gallon of a bottled drink).

• PepsiCo to become ‘net water positive’ by 2030: ‘Time is running out for the world to act on water’  PepsiCo wants to become ‘net water positive’ by 2030, meaning the beverage giant will replenish more water than it uses to produce its food and beverage brands…. Read more

A reader, Ken Kaszak, sent me a link to a post on Quora Digest featuring this “advertisement,” which I put in quotes because it is not, in fact, an actual Coca-Cola ad; it is a joke at Coca-Cola’s expense.

I know this because I wrote about it in Soda Politics.  For starters, the ad says it is produced by “The Soda Pop Board,” but no such trade association exists.  Here’s the page from Soda Politics.

I included a footnote that explains where this parody came from: “The origins of the Parody ad are explained by Dryznar J. Favor from clever dudes, March 4, 2004. http://jdryznar.livejournal.com/64477.html.  The “Not parody” image was constructed from information from AND at www.eatright.org/corporatesponsors.  The parody ad was created by RJ White, as he explains at http://rjwhite.tumblr.com/post/472668874/fact-checking.  It was posted at The City Desk: Fictional Urbanism.  http://thecitydesk.net/baby_soda_ad.”

Once something like this starts going around, there’s no stopping it, not least because this ad seems so plausible, given the kinds of marketing I describe in my book.

Remember these?  They were for real, but fortunately are not around any more.  Parents who used these bottles put in them what was on the labels.

The study: Effects of Unsweetened Preloads and Preloads Sweetened with Caloric or Low-/No-Calorie [LNCS] Sweeteners on Subsequent Energy Intakes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Controlled Human Intervention Studies.  Han Youl Lee, Maia Jack, Theresa Poon, Daniel Noori, Carolina Venditti, Samer Hamamji, Kathy Musa-Veloso.  Advances in Nutrition, nmaa157, https://doi.org/10.1093/advances/nmaa157

Conclusions:  “These findings suggest that LNCS-sweetened foods and beverages are viable alternatives to CS-sweetened foods and beverages to manage short-term energy intake.

Funder: The American Beverage Association provided funding for the work presented herein.

Author disclosures: MJ is a paid employee of the American Beverage Association. Intertek Health Sciences, Inc.(HYL, TP, DN, CV, SH, KMV), works for the American Beverage Association as paid scientific and regulatory consultants.

Comment: This is a study paid for by the American Beverage Association, a trade association for the makers of soft drinks, sweetened with sugars or artificial sweeteners, conducted in-house.  Its purpose is to demonstrate that artificial and low-calorie sweeteners will help you lose weight, something that independently funded studies often do not.  I’d classsify this as marketing research.  I don’t think it belongs in professional journals published by the American Society for Nutrition.  We need a new journal for this, as Corinna Hawkes of City University London once suggested, “The Journal of Industry-Funded Research.”

Coca-Cola, according to an account in the Wall Street Journal, announced that it is cutting 2,200 jobs globally, including 1,200 in the U.S., as a result of the pandemic-induced closure of the places where its products are sold: restaurants, bars, movie theaters and sports stadiums.

The company expects to save $350 to $550 million annually as a result.

Let’s put these savings in context.  Coca-Cola brought in $37.27 billion in revenues in 2019.

For the company, the eliminated jobs mean “less decision making, less bureaucracy and ultimately less people.”

Corporations, as I have reported previously, have pledged to consider social values—like fairness to employees—in their day to day operations as much as they consider returns to stockholders.

If they are going to make such promises, they need to be held to them.

Hence: the global campaign for Corporate Accountability.