Three years ago South Africa introduced Africa’s first major tax on sugar-sweetened beverages based on grams of sugar. The tax now stands at about 11% of the price per litre.
We assessed the impact in recently published research. We found that the health promotion levy coincided with large reductions in purchases of taxable beverages, in terms of both volume and sugar quantities. We didn’t find significant changes for non-taxable beverages.
This isn’t the first research to show positive outcomes from the levy. A national study one year after it was introduced found households in urban areas halved the volume of sugary beverages they bought, cutting their sugar intake by nearly a third. Similar results were found regionally in Soweto in Gauteng.