Can the sugar tax dent Botswana's sweet tooth?

Spira Tlhankane | Friday February 5, 2021 12:38

And this love for sweetened beverages is even engraved into children’s psyche by parents or guardians as they pack lunch boxes that include fruit juices and soft drinks which are high in sugar content.

But that would soon change because even your favourite orange squash will be more expensive.

With the goal of pushing Botswana’s population towards healthier alternatives, this week Minister of Finance and Economic Development Dr Thapelo Matsheka announced that the government will introduce a levy on sweetened beverages related to their sugar content at a rate of two Thebe per gramme of sugar above a content of 4g of sugar per 100 millilitres. Although he admitted that the levy will raise revenues, Dr Matsheka emphasised that this will be done to address  health challenge.

“We have a health problem in Botswana with many people consuming too much sugar, leading to problems of obesity and diseases such as diabetes,” he said.

Some people question whether this could actually work and stem the tide of Batswana’s sweet tooth. But while Dr Matsheka revealed this will raise the price of  drinks moderately, it is expected that this will provide an incentive for consumers to switch to drinks with lower sugar content, and for manufacturers to do the same.

Some critics already ridicule the introduction of the levy as ineffective due to consumers’ struggle to change, but the government hails the tax principally as a means to curb soaring obesity rates, tooth decay and non-communicable diseases (NCD) such as diabetes.

It is no secret that Botswana has been facing severe and growing obesity problem.

The 2019 BMJ cross-sectional study on socio-economic and behavioural determinants of overweight/obesity amongst adults in Botswana found out that there was a high prevalence of overweight/obesity in the adult population of Botswana especially women, older adults and people with higher education levels and it stood at 41.3% of the study population.

Other important finding of the study was that nutrition transition from low-calorie diets to sweeteners amongst others, contributes to a greater risk of overweight/obesity in Botswana.

Meanwhile, a 2017 World Health Organisation (WHO) report revealed that sugary drinks are a major contributor to obesity, diabetes and tooth decay.

Furthermore, according to WHO, sugary drinks are a major source of sugar in the diet, and its consumption is increasing in most countries, especially amongst children and adolescents.  It has been established that people who consume sugary drinks regularly, usually one to two cans of drinks a day or more, have a 26% greater risk of developing Type 2 diabetes than people who rarely consume such drinks.

According to the report, evidence shows that a tax on sugary drinks that raises prices by 20% can lead to a reduction in consumption of around 20%, thus preventing obesity and diabetes. Researchers who support the taxes acknowledge that small price increases are unlikely to deter infrequent sweet beverage drinkers. The hope from the Botswana government is that with the soon to be introduced levy at a rate of two thebe per gramme, it will make a dent in consumption by people with more serious habits. These are people who drink roughly 600 calories worth of sugary beverages on any given day.

WHO recommends adults to limit their daily caloric intake from added sugar to not more than five percent, which equates to about six teaspoons of sugar per day.

 But with a can of soda containing up to 10 teaspoons and a bottle of juice containing up to six teaspoons of sugar, the lack of awareness by most people about these numbers has led to the rising prevalence of obesity and NCD.

Although Botswana is finally coming to the fore with the levy on sugary drinks, many other countries worldwide had long imposed a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages. While it is hard to shift people’s behaviours, the government’s introduction of this levy shows that the latter believes that this is one of the impactful and important policies to move the needle on unhealthy diet habits.

While in 2008, the government of Botswana then under the leadership of Ian Khama imposed a levy on all alcohol products to deal with problematic drinking in the country, several studies over the years found out that the alcohol levy has not made a significant reduction in excessive alcohol intake and it has not changed the drinking trends of people as it was envisaged when the alcohol levy was implemented. Whereas for alcohol it could be a different case altogether, the sugary drinks levy could help mitigate the harms of sugary beverages.  The use of taxes to compel people to make healthier choices has a long history in many countries across the world. For instance, a study conducted by the Mexican National Institute of Public Health and the University of North Carolina evaluating the first two years of implementation showed that in Mexico, two years after the introduction of a tax on sugary drinks, households with the fewest resources reduced their purchases of sugary drinks by 11.7%, compared to 7.6% for the general population.

Besides Mexico, sugar taxes have been implemented across the world and studies from the United Kingdom (UK) have shown that in the short term, young consumers were likely to reduce their sugar consumption by up to 80% although older consumers were less prone to change their ways.

In these countries, tax on sugary drinks enabled policymakers to improve health outcomes by reducing unhealthy consumption, and at the same time generate additional tax revenue for more spending to improve health care systems, encourage healthier diets, increase physical activity, further increasing the value of this measure.  Of course it would take years after implementation to judge the impact of this levy but now that Botswana has joined the sugar tax club the question that would remain is will it be effective? This tax might save billions of canines, lower the incidence of obesity and diabetes and reduce the cost of healthcare.

WHO guidelines recommend that to prevent obesity and tooth decay, adults and children should reduce their consumption of free sugars to less than 10% of their daily energy intake equivalent to around 12 teaspoons of table sugar for adults. But some people are somewhat insensitive to price increases as it has shown with alcohol so old habits indeed die hard.

By introducing this levy the government is aware that taxation alone is not enough to curb Batswana’ addiction to sugar, therefore a more all-inclusive approach will be key in inspiring a healthier population in years to come.