No Sugarcoating the Climate Crisis: Why Sugar Taxation is the Way Forward

When we consider a list of foods that has an adverse impact on the environment, meat and dairy may first come to mind. Using animals for food and livestock is responsible for as much as 57% of all food production emissions. Beef alone is responsible for a quarter of emissions produced by raising and growing food (Xu et al., 2021).

While the animal husbandry industry is already under intense scrutiny, sugar could be next.. While the negative impact of sugar on one’s health is well known, the harmful effect on the environment is sweetly positioned under the radar.

Research on the field, however, doesn’t sugarcoat the facts: sugar is bad for us and the planet. The situation is so critical that experts believe a sugar tax is the way forward.

Sugar and the climate crisis

Sugar is the most produced food crop in the world, even more than rice and wheat. Sugar is both a land and water-intensive crop, which means that it has a significant carbon footprint. Food intelligence company Spoonshot estimates that the global water footprint of producing 1 kg of refined sugar from sugarcane is 1782 liters of water- that’s two years’ worth of drinking water for one person.

Sugar production is also a major threat to biodiversity and the planet. Sugar production in the Amazon has done irreparable damage to fragile ecosystems in the region. For every ton of sugar produced, 241 kg of carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere (de Figueiredo et al., 2021).

Sugar and public health crises

The impact of sugar in our lives is alarmingly dangerous. Excessive sugar consumption is negatively linked to cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, cholesterol, obesity, dental cavities and more.

While it is argued that the use of sugar should remain a personal choice, these health conditions end up imposing a financial burden on society. In terms of health crises, sugar is already the “tobacco” of the 21st century.

While it may not be possible to completely cut sugar out of our lives, it’s clear that we need to reduce and regulate sugar production and consumption. One of the most effective ways to do that is by introducing a sugar tax.

The logic behind sugar taxation

Changing public behavior for the better is a difficult task, but it is not impossible by any means. One of the most effective ways to influence public behavior is through taxation. Historically, high tax rates have been an effective way to discourage or deter undesirable behavior.

In the tobacco industry, high tax rates have helped millions to quit smoking and precluded hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths (Saenz-de-Miera et al., 2022). According to research conducted on the effects of a sugar tax, here are some of the biggest benefits of having one.

Reduced Sugar Use and Lower Obesity Rates

According to a study conducted by Powell et al. (2013), a tax on sugary beverages increases prices by up to 20%. Since the cost of these taxes are passed down to consumers, a sugar tax could bring down sugar consumption by as much as 20%, effectively reducing obesity and diabetes rates.

Potential for Massive Healthcare Savings

Even an incremental tax rate pays off huge dividends. Financial models indicate that a tax rate that is as low as 1% per ounce of sugar could help the United States of America save as much as $17 billion in healthcare costs per year (Wang et al., 2014).

Improves the Health of the General Population

The newfound revenue from the sugar tax can be as high as $17 billion per year (Wang et al., 2014). This revenue can be redirected into initiatives aimed at improving the health of the population. Such initiatives include healthcare reforms, educational campaigns and activities promoting a healthy, active lifestyle.

Benefits vulnerable sections of the population

It’s a common misconception that a sugar tax would be most harmful on the poorest sections of society. Critics of sugar taxation claim that lower-income groups would be forced to spend a disproportionate amount on sugary products.

However, research shows that for lower-income households, sugar taxes were an effective deterrent to sugar consumption. For households with the fewest resources, a tax on sugar reduced their purchase of sugary drinks by as much as 11.7%. For context, the average reduction in sugar consumption for the rest of the population was 7.6% (Colchero et al., 2017).

Case study: Sugar taxation in Mexico

Mexico offers a successful, replicable example in the implementation of a sugar tax. In Mexico, 73% of adults are overweight or obese (Shamah-Levy et al., 2017).

In 2014, the government of Mexico implemented a 1 peso per liter tax on any non-alcoholic beverage with added sugar. This charge was passed on to the consumers and increased the price of sugary drinks by 10%.

A study by Colchero et al. (2017) evaluating the effectiveness of the sugar tax found that in the first two years, there was a 7.6% drop in the purchase of taxed sugary drinks in 2014 and 2015. The tax benefited low-income households the most, as their consumption of taxed sugary drinks fell by as much as 12%.

The tax helped to raise awareness of the detrimental health effects of sugar and reduce public sugar consumption. Furthermore, the tax raised a revenue of almost $3 billion in the first two years of implementation, which is being redirected to installing water fountains in schools.

Why Sugar Taxation is The Way Forward

A sugar tax is a difficult conversation to have with the public - we can’t just pull out our sweet tooth. In fact, we consume sugar like the air we breathe. All the time without realizing.

However, governments around the world are reaching similar conclusions about the need to tax sugar. In addition to the climate crisis, sugar is also the main culprit behind the obesity epidemic that plagues much of the world. If current obesity trends are to continue, it is estimated that in Africa, more people will die of obesity than hunger.

To date, nearly thirty countries and regions have introduced some sort of sugar tax. There are promising signs that more will follow.

The solution isn’t to give up sugar completely, but to understand why taxing may be necessary. There are moral and ethical arguments against a sugar tax, but with the climate crisis looming, there are equally convincing perspectives for why we need one.

We can’t sugarcoat the facts anymore: sugar is one of the biggest threats to our health and mother earth. Indeed, the right step forward may be bitter-sweet.

References

Colchero, M.A., Popkin, B.M., Ng SW. (2017). In Mexico, evidence of sustained consumer response two years after implementing a sugar-sweetened beverage tax. Health Aff 36(3), 564-571. doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.2016.1231

de Figueiredo, E. B., Panosso, A. R., Romão, R., & La Scala, N. (2010). Greenhouse gas emission associated with sugar production in southern Brazil. Carbon Balance and Management, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/1750-0680-5-3

Powell, L.M., Chriqui J.F., Khan T., Wada R., Chaloupka F.J. (2013). Assessing the potential effectiveness of food and beverage taxes and subsidies for improving public health: a systematic review of prices, demand and body weight outcomes. Obesity Reviews, 14, 110-128.

Saenz-de-Miera, B., Wu, D. C., Essue, B. M., Maldonado, N., Jha, P., & Reynales-Shigematsu, L. M. (2022, January 20). The distributional effects of tobacco tax increases across regions in Mexico: an extended cost-effectiveness analysis. International Journal for Equity in Health, 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-021-01603-2

Shamah-Levy, T., Ruiz-Matus, C., Rivera-Dommarco, J., Kuri-Morales, P., Cuevas-Nasu, L., Jiménez-Corona, M. E., ... & Hernández-Ávila, M. (2017). Encuesta Nacional de Salud y Nutrición de Medio Camino 2016. Resultados Nacionales. Cuernavaca, México: Instituto Nacional de Salud Pública, 98-105.

Wang Y.C., Coxson P., Shen Y., Goldman L., Bibbins-Domingo K. (2014). A penny-per-ounce tax on sugar-sweetened beverages would cut health and cost burdens of diabetes. Health Affairs, 31(1), 199-207

Xu, X., Sharma, P., Shu, S., Lin, T. S., Ciais, P., Tubiello, F. N., Smith, P., Campbell, N., & Jain, A. K. (2021). Global greenhouse gas emissions from animal-based foods are twice those of plant-based foods. Nature Food, 2(9), 724–732. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-021-00358-x