Bitter about sugar tax

The South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) has joined the fray against the proposed ‘sugar tax’ which has raised an outcry countrywide, with an Alexandra business organisation claiming it would cost the beverage industry big time.

The president of Alexandra-based Tshebedisano Support Network, Simon Mabeletsa who heads the local body of small businesses in the township, most of whom trade in beverages, said the industry was poised to lose more than 70 000 jobs if the tax was implemented.

Adding its voice to the ongoing war of words over the proposed tax, SAIRR said there was no convincing health rationale for the implementation of this sugar tax. “The National Treasury has no convincing reason to believe that its proposed tax on sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) will be effective against obesity,” said the SAIRR in a policy paper on the proposed tax, published recently.

“The ‘mathematical model’ the treasury cites as evidence that a 20 per cent tax on sugar-sweetened beverages will reduce obesity by 3.8 per cent among men and 2.4 per cent among women has no hard data to support it.

“Instead, it rests on nothing but five assumptions, none of which is likely to hold true in the real world. The model is also far more tentative about its predictions than the treasury admits, saying that the reduction in obesity could be as little as 0.4 per cent among men and 0.3 per cent among women,” the SAIRR policy paper said.

The SAIRR said even these small gains will be achieved only if all five of the assumptions on which the model rests are fulfilled in practice. Even though the treasury fails to point this out, the model also stresses the need for further research on various important issues.

The network called for more research into issues such as the possible effect of SSB consumption on the daily energy balance and weight change; the extent to which reduced SSB sales would have adverse economic or social consequences, such as job losses; and whether these adverse consequences would outweigh the benefits of reduced obesity.

The treasury also claims that the SSB tax is the most ‘cost-effective’ intervention against obesity, but the network pointed out that international experience has shown that sugar taxes have little, if any, impact on obesity, while the most effective interventions include portion control, reformulation, parental education and the promotion of physical exercise at schools.

Also read: Time to pay up

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