Excess sugar intake is associated with some health problems such as obesity, diabetes and tooth decay. In line with Gupta et al. (2019), Australia debates have begun between politicians, food and beverage industries and health experts on taxation of sugar and sugar-sweetened products. Parties like dieticians, health experts, parents and others are in support of taxation. However, manufacturers in the food industry are against imposing taxation due to numerous reasons. Imposing taxation on sugar would discourage the excessive intake of sugar and increase tax revenue to finance improved health care projects. Critics disagree and argue that this is a regressive tax that will only take more money from low-income families.
Sugar tax is the levy imposed on sugar and any other sugar products to crack down on high sugar levels in soft drinks. In agreement with Breda et al. (2019), the World health organization (WHO) implemented a global action plan to prevent and control the spread of infectious diseases. Recommendations in this plan are that members states should regulate the intake of unhealthy products by use of tax and subsidies to promote the consumption of healthier products. For instance, the WHO recommends that governments should tax sugar to reduce the intake levels and curb diseases like obesity, type 2 diabetes and tooth decay. Based on their recommendations, sub-national jurisdictions and more than 30 countries globally have introduced taxes on sugar and sugar-sweetened products. UAE, Sri Lanka, Portugal and Mexico are some of the countries overseas that have implemented sugar tax and show a significant drop in consumption of sugar. Even though sugar intake has reduced significantly, a lot still has to be done to note a significant impact in the health sector. In Australia, the majority of the people support sugar taxation and view it as an important puzzle in reducing cases of obesity except for food and beverage industries. According to a survey by Louie et al. (2016), 90 per cent of parents in Australia are in support of levying sugar. However, the majority of those in support of sugar taxation emphasize that alone, sugar taxation cannot solve the obesity and diabetes issues.
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Taxation of sugar and its products has a lot of benefits. Research shows that taxation of sugar increases the prices of soft drinks and any other sugar products discouraging consumption. A study conducted shows that 20 per cent tax on sugar potentially reduces 13.6 percent of sugar consumption. Such a drop could lead to 800 fewer people developing type 2 diabetes. Besides, the association of dieticians in Australia explain that SSB tax would influence the food industry to regulate the sugar levels in products ( Miller et al. 2019) . Industries would come up with better and healthier products to avoid paying high taxes. In terms of health care, studies show that a 20% additional tax would lead to a significant reduction in BMI and the number of obesity cases. Such a drop translates to health gains of approximately 170,000 healthy life of the Australian population. Nevertheless, studies show that revenue collected sugar tax would be more than $400m annually. Such resources would give the government a large amount of money to work in healthcare programs for obesity prevention and provide healthy food for low-income families.
Taxation on sugar may have numerous benefits to the health system, but it also has negative impacts. For instance, food industries such as coca-cola argue that taxation of sugary products does not work to reduce the rates of obesity ( Allen & Allen (2020). Also, Menzies research institute argues that there is no enough evidence that sugar is the main source of obesity. Further, the study explains that a drop in sugar intake does not prove that obesity rates will reduce. Besides, the impacts of taxation of sugar can only be measured in 10 years, and no evidence has been presented to show any significant change. Moreover, if taxation is imposed, low-income families and manufacturers would suffer the most. Some people stand to lose their job while those earning very little will have to choose between taking sugary drinks and catering for essential needs. Personally, sugar taxation is of great advantage to Australia. Despite, the fact that it has some negative impacts, the positive out does the negatives. Manufacturers barely have anything to lose since they can switch to the production of healthier drinks. Low-income families will also benefit a lot from the money collected from tax since it will be invested in free healthcare programs.
In conclusion, sugar taxation has strong economic and social benefits. Levy on sugar has the potential to reduce obesity and diabetes when practiced long-term. Numerous studies show that taxation of sugar has significantly reduced sugar intake in Mexico, UK and UAE. However, there is a high probability that taxation of sugar will help reduce health-related problems, but there is no evidence that sugar taxation alone will have any significant impact. Even though manufacturers of soft drinks may experience losses, they will gain new market opportunities for low sugar content drink with no tax. Finally, sugar taxation benefits the national health services in Australia. Generally, the net revenue will increase from sugar tax hence minimal, or no economic disruption will be experienced.
References
Allen, W. M., & Allen, K. J. (2020). Should Australia tax sugar‐sweetened beverages?. Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health , 56 (1), 8-15.
Breda, J., Jewell, J., & Keller, A. (2019). The importance of the World Health Organization sugar guidelines for dental health and obesity prevention. Caries research , 53 (2), 149-152.
Gupta, A., Miller, C., Harford, J., Smithers, L. G., & Braunack-Mayer, A. (2019). Australia’s sugar tale. Public health nutrition , 22 (14), 2682-2687.
Louie, J. C. Y., Moshtaghian, H., Rangan, A. M., Flood, V. M., & Gill, T. P. (2016). Intake and sources of added sugars among Australian children and adolescents. European journal of nutrition , 55 (8), 2347-2355.
Miller, C. L., Dono, J., Wakefield, M. A., Pettigrew, S., Coveney, J., Roder, D., ... & Ettridge, K. A. (2019). Are Australians ready for warning labels, marketing bans and sugary drink taxes? Two cross-sectional surveys measuring support for policy responses to sugar-sweetened beverages. BMJ open , 9 (6), e027962.
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