Published on
Updated
Reading 2 mins.
Reduce obesity by introducing taxes on foods that are too sweet and too salty. More and more European countries are adopting this political path as scientists estimate that more than half of the population of the old continent will be obese in 2050. Hungary and the United Kingdom are the most authoritarian countries.
Goal: halve childhood obesity by 2030
“One buy, one free“. This is an enticing promotion that often has something to push us to consume, including for foods that are not very recommendable from a nutritional point of view. This is the reason why the United Kingdom would like to ban this type of offer from the start. The device must also concern additional free offers on products rich in fats, salts and sugars, while advertisements highlighting food considered as junk food must be prohibited on television before 9 p.m. in 2025.
These measures are part of a specific ambition: to halve childhood obesity by 2030. The country of His Majesty Charles III has therefore decided to play the card of severity to try to keep subjects away from foods that are too fatty. and too sweet. A policy that has earned it the status of a “nanny state”, that is to say a country that infantilizes its population by constraining it with taxes.
Hungary bets on the “hamburger tax” and the “chips tax”
As a result, the UK tops the ranking of the most restrictive countries on food and drink, in a report by the Institute of Economic Affairs and European Policy Information Centerrelayed by the Telegram. In Europe, Hungary appears to be the most severe state on this point. The country led by Viktor Orban applies the most draconian food and drink policy among the thirty European countries that make up this index. It should be remembered that Hungary applies the highest VAT in Europe at 27%. In 2011, the Hungarian Parliament decided on a so-called “hamburger” tax to try to curb obesity and curb cravings for junk food. At the beginning of the 2010s, this Central European republic had even already imagined a tax on very salty and sweet products. It was then called the chips tax.
NO to diets, YES to WW!
France is at the bottom of the ranking
However, the Hungarian and English “examples” are not exceptional cases. The analysis of the Institute of Economic Affairs and European Policy Information Center indeed underlines that since 2017 the tax on sugary drinks has become a measure which has become generalized to concern twelve European countries, and no longer five.
On the other hand, there are many countries that do not gamble on the wallet of their population to prevent them from eating too fatty or too salty. Germany is the most liberal country on this point, along with the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Malta, Austria, Cyprus, Greece, the Netherlands and Romania. For its part, France is at the bottom of the ranking with a slightly restrictive policy, evaluated at 3 out of 10.
Note that this index is not only interested in taxes on food and beverages, but also those on alcohol, tobacco and electronic cigarettes. And when we aggregate all the taxes imposed on consumers to supposedly force them not to be in excess, we find Turkey at the very top of the scale of severity. If we exclude it from the European geographical space, Norway is first because of its restrictive measures on alcohol.