The World Health Organization has released a new guideline outlining effective strategies to foster food environments that support healthy dietary choices. Emphasizing fiscal policies as a pivotal tool, the guideline recommends measures to discourage consumption of foods linked to unhealthy diets while promoting healthier options through subsidies and other forms of support.
Modern food environments are saturated with easily accessible, highly processed foods containing unhealthy levels of fats, sugars, and sodium. These products are often aggressively marketed and competitively priced, presenting consumers with significant challenges in making nutritious food choices. Poor dietary habits contribute significantly to global public health risks, including noncommunicable diseases such as obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and certain cancers.
The guideline underscores mounting evidence that levying taxes on items like sugar-sweetened beverages can effectively reduce their consumption. Conversely, subsidies aimed at fruits and vegetables make these healthier choices more affordable and accessible, thereby encouraging their uptake and fostering positive shifts in consumer behavior. Implementing such fiscal policies represents a promising strategy to steer individuals towards healthier dietary patterns by making nutritious options more convenient and economical.
Dr. Ruediger Krech, Director of the WHO’s Department of Health Promotion, highlights the potential impact of fiscal policies on consumer behavior and market dynamics through price adjustments. He stresses that subsidies can stimulate the consumption of healthful products, while taxes can discourage the consumption of harmful ones and incentivize industry reformulation.
Governments are identified as pivotal actors in alleviating the burden of diet-related noncommunicable diseases, addressing malnutrition comprehensively, and advocating for healthy dietary practices. To date, an increasing number of countries have adopted national taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages, with 115 member states implementing such measures as of February 2024. Additionally, 41 member states have instituted national taxation on various categories of unhealthy foods. However, fewer countries have implemented subsidies to bolster the consumption of nutritious foods or eliminated taxes on healthful items and subsidies on unwholesome products.
Dr. Francesco Branca, Director of the WHO’s Department of Nutrition and Food Safety, underscores the progress made by governments worldwide in taxing sugar-sweetened beverages while acknowledging ongoing challenges in formulating effective fiscal policies to advance healthy diets. He views the guideline as an invaluable resource empowering member states to cultivate food environments that support health across all levels of society.
In conclusion, the WHO guideline equips member states with evidence-based recommendations to implement fiscal policies promoting healthy diets, positioning these measures as integral components of a comprehensive strategy to enhance population health globally.
