Lower tax urged on sugar sweetened beverages

Consumer advocacy group CitizenWatch Philippines has joined the mounting calls to minimize the impact of the sugar sweetened beverage taxes to poor consumers in the pending House Bill (HB) 5636 currently pending in the Senate.

Should the bill passed into law, its repercussions will “significantly impact the lives of millions of low-income Filipino consumers, said Atty Tim Abejo, CitizenWatch Convenor.

“It’s really the low-income earners who consume these products — powdered juice drinks, carbonated softdrinks and other beverages — on a daily basis, and higher prices could take a toll on their everyday expenses as once inexpensive products become suddenly unaffordable,” he explained.

The House-approved version of the proposed tax measure, part of the government’s banner tax reform program called Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion or TRAIN, imposes R10 per liter for drinks containing purely locally produced sugar and R20 on beverages with imported sugar or sweeteners.

This can drive the prices of goods to double or even triple their current prices, for instance just think of a 1 liter sachet powdered juice now at 9 pesos suddenly sold at R30! Consumers sari-sari store and carinderia owners will all take a big hit, Abejo warned.

He cited the over 300,000 signatures gathered by the Philippine Association of Stores and Carinderia Owners (PASCO) from across the country in opposition of the so-called “sweet tax.”

“According to PASCO, the proposed tax measure will likely result in the loss of 40 to 50 percent of the total income of the 1.3 million sarisari store owners,” Abejo said.

Abejo said that said CitizenWatch supports the more consumer-friendly proposal by Senator JV Ejercito to lower the sugar sweetened beverage taxes, including, among others, three centavos (R0.03) per gram of sugar on sweetened beverages using purely caloric sweeteners except for those using purely coconut sap sugar.