Sugary Drink Tax Aimed at Improving Nutrition Would Generate $45M Annually, Says Dr. Nunn
Friday, February 26, 2021
If enacted, proposed legislation working its way through the Rhode Island State House to tax sugary drinks would designate a portion of the revenues generated to expand access to nutritious food for low-income families by establishing a Retail SNAP Incentive Program that would incentivize consumption of healthy fruits and vegetables.
“Now, more than ever, many Rhode Islanders are hungry and have limited access to healthy foods. This important legislation will help alleviate hunger and promote healthy eating across Rhode Island,” said Dr. Amy Nunn, Executive Director of the Rhode Island Public Health Institute.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST“The way that the sugary drink tax will work, is that it's a 1.5 cents per ounce [tax] that is issued to the distributors and then that usually is passed along to the retailers and to the consumers in the retail setting,” said Nunn during an interview on GoLocal LIVE on Thursday, who said the estimate is that it would generate about $45 million per year in the state of Rhode Island.
The American Beverage Asccoaition, which claims to have a direct economic impact of more than $189 billion across the United States and provides more than 264,000 jobs nationally, says the proposed sugary drink tax is bad for business.
“A beverage tax hurts working families, small local businesses and their employees the hardest. There could not be a worse time to add to the burdens of families and local restaurants than while the state is trying to recover from a historic economic downturn brought on by the coronavirus,” said William Dermody Jr., Vice President, Media & Public Affairs for American Beverage Association in a statement.
“We believe we should be helping people consume less sugar, but there are more effective and less harmful ways than hiking prices on struggling families and costing the state’s businesses sales and jobs. Beverage companies have been taking bold actions to reduce the sugar people get from beverages and it is working. Our product innovation and marketing of more choices with less sugar and smaller portions are helping people cut sugar in their diets,” adds Dermody.
Advocates for the legislation cite that according to Healthy Food America, a sugary drinks tax can reduce sales of sugary beverages, improve health equity and reduce the rate of costly and preventable diseases.
The State of Childhood Obesity also reports that in Rhode Island, obesity rates nearly tripled from 11.1 percent in 1990 to 30.0 percent in 2019. Rhode Island obesity rates are similar to those in the American South. Low-income populations and communities of color in Rhode Island also experience higher rates of obesity than non-Hispanic White communities. In Rhode Island, 17.5% of youth ages 10 to 17 have obesity, giving Rhode Island a ranking of 11 among the 50 states and D.C.
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