UAE to Link Drink Prices to Sugar Content Starting in 2026
Jul 20, 2025
The Ministry of Finance and the Federal Tax Authority have announced that taxes on sweetened beverages will be calculated based on their sugar content per 100 millilitres starting in 2026. The move aims to address rising rates of obesity, diabetes, and related chronic conditions by incentivising lower-sugar formulations.
This policy builds on the UAE's existing tax on sugary soft drinks introduced in 2017, which has been credited with helping reduce the incidence of Type 2 diabetes. A US-based study estimates that sugary drinks contribute to 2.2 million new global diabetes cases and 1.2 million cardiovascular disease cases annually. In the Middle East, they were linked to approximately 15% of all diabetes cases, according to research published in Nature Medicine by Tufts University.
Sugar taxes were first implemented in the Gulf by Saudi Arabia and the UAE and were later adopted by Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar. While Bahrain saw diabetes prevalence drop from 19.5% in 2011 to 11.3% in 2021, Oman and Kuwait reported increases over the same period. Health experts note that while sugar taxes can reduce overall calorie intake, their full impact tends to unfold gradually as part of long-term public health strategies.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Egypt Independent
2 hours ago
- Egypt Independent
‘We are watching our colleagues waste away': Aid workers, doctors, journalists risk starvation alongside people in Gaza
Dozens of international humanitarian organizations warned Israel's blockade of aid into Gaza is endangering the lives of doctors and aid workers, while a major news agency says it is trying to evacuate its remaining freelance journalists because the situation has become 'untenable.' In a joint statement, 111 international humanitarian organizations called on Israel to end its blockade, restore the full flow of food, clean water and medical supplies to Gaza, and agree to a ceasefire. The coalition warned Wednesday that supplies in the enclave are now 'totally depleted' and that humanitarian groups are 'witnessing their own colleagues and partners waste away before their eyes.' 'As the Israeli government's siege starves the people of Gaza, aid workers are now joining the same food lines, risking being shot just to feed their families,' said the statement, whose signatories include Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), Amnesty International, and the Norwegian Refugee Council. The statement followed a scathing indictment of Israel by 28 Western nations, who accused the country of 'drip feeding' aid into the Gaza Strip. Israel's foreign ministry rejected the joint statement – which was not signed by the US – as 'disconnected from reality. The Israeli military 'must stop killing people' seeking aid in Gaza, the European Union's top diplomat said Tuesday. 'The killing of civilians seeking aid in Gaza is indefensible,' Kaja Kallas, the EU's high representative for foreign affairs, said in a post on X. In the last 24 hours, 15 people, including four children, had died of starvation across Gaza, according to the Palestinian health ministry. 'Cases of malnutrition and starvation are arriving at Gaza's hospitals every moment,' said Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Medical Complex, told CNN Tuesday. Doctors and humanitarians 'fainting' from hunger, UN says Gaza was already heavily dependent on aid and commercial shipments of food before Israel launched its war on Hamas, following the October 2023 attack. Israel has previously blamed Hamas for its decision to halt aid shipments, alleging the militant group was stealing supplies and profiting from it. Hamas has denied this allegation. Israeli authorities have also blamed United Nations agencies, accusing them of not picking up aid that is ready to move into Gaza. But the UN asserts that Israeli forces frequently deny permission to move aid within the enclave, and that much more is waiting to be allowed in. Injured Palestinians are transported to hospitals after Israeli forces open fired on civilians waiting for humanitarian aid in the Zikim area, on July 20, 2025. Ali Jadallah/Anadolu/Getty Images In the statement Wednesday, the coalition of humanitarian agencies also criticized the controversial Israeli-and-US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which began operating on May 27. The organizations said shootings occurred almost daily at food distribution sites. Juliette Touma, Director of Communications with the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, said in a separate statement that seeking food had 'become as deadly as the bombardments.' She criticized the distribution scheme by the GHF as 'a sadistic death-trap,' saying 'snipers open fire randomly on crowds as if they're given a license to kill.' And she added that care workers were unable to perform their duties due to a lack of food. 'Doctors, nurses, journalists, humanitarians' are among staff who are 'hungry… fainting due to hunger and exhaustion while performing their duties,' she said. Israel has long sought to dismantle UNRWA, arguing that some of its employees are affiliated with Hamas, and that its schools teach hate against Israel. UNRWA has repeatedly denied these accusations. As of July 21, 1,054 people had been killed while trying to get food in Gaza—766 near GHF sites and 288 near UN and other humanitarian organizations' aid convoys, according to UN human rights office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan. The Israeli military has acknowledged firing warning shots toward crowds in some instances and denied responsibility for other incidents. In late June, the military said it had 'reorganized' the approach routes to aid sites to minimize 'friction with the population,' but the killings have continued. Last Wednesday, GHF said 19 people were trampled to death and another person was fatally stabbed in a crowd crush at one of its aid sites. It was the first time the group had acknowledged deaths at one of its sites. 'I don't have the power to cover media anymore' International news agency, Agence France-Presse (AFP), said Tuesday it is trying to evacuate its remaining freelance staff from Gaza because the situation has become 'untenable.' Alongside Reuters and the Associated Press, Paris-headquartered AFP is one of a trio of major global news agencies that provide other media outlets with text, photo and video images from around the world. Independent journalists are not able to operate in Gaza because of Israeli and Egyptian restrictions on entry to the strip. Palestinian reporters have become the eyes and ears of those suffering inside Gaza during the 21-month conflict and are living in the same arduous conditions as the rest of the population. AFP's main journalist union Société de Journalistes (SDJ), warned on Monday that some of the news agency's remaining freelance journalists inside Gaza were starving and too weak to work. 'Without immediate intervention, the last reporters in Gaza will die,' the union said in a statement. The SDJ said AFP had been working with a freelance reporter, three photographers, and six freelance video journalists in the Gaza Strip. The union shared a social media post from AFP staff, Bashar Taleb, who works for the agency as a photographer, describing the grave conditions in the besieged enclave. 'I don't have the power to cover media anymore. My body is lean and I no longer have the ability to walk,' Taleb, 30, wrote in a Facebook post on Saturday, according to the SDJ's statement. Bashar has been living in the ruins of his home in Gaza City with his mother, four brothers, sisters and the family of one of his brothers since February, according to the statement. On Sunday morning, he reported that one of his brothers had 'fallen, due to hunger.' Another AFP staffer, identified by a single name, Ahlam, was quoted saying: 'Every time I leave the tent to cover an event, do an interview or document a story, I don't know if I'll come back alive.' Her biggest issue is the lack of food and water, she told the union. A man wearing a press vest films the World Press Freedom Day demonstration in Gaza City on May 4, 2025. Saeed Jaras/AFP/MiddleFrench Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said on Tuesday that France hopes to evacuate some journalists' colleagues 'in the coming weeks' following calls from the SDJ. 'We are dedicating lots of energy,' to get them out, Barrot said in an interview with French radio station FranceInter. He added that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is 'inhumane,' describing it as a 'scandal that must stop immediately.' AFP said it successfully evacuated eight of its employees from Gaza and their families between January and April 2024, and the agency is now 'taking the same steps for its freelance staff, despite the extreme difficulty of leaving a territory subject to a strict blockade.' 'Their lives are in danger, so we urgently call on the Israeli authorities to authorize their immediate evacuation with their families,' it added. CNN has reached out to the Israeli foreign ministry and the Prime Minister's Office for comment. The Israel-Gaza war has killed more journalists over the course of a year than in any other conflict since the Committee to Project Journalists began collecting data three decades ago. At least 186 journalists and media workers were killed and 89 were imprisoned since the war began. As food struggles to reach displaced people and the journalists among them in Gaza, the SDJ said in its statement: 'Since AFP was founded in 1944, we have lost journalists in conflicts, some have been injured, others taken prisoner. But none of us can ever remember seeing colleagues die of hunger.'
Al-Ahram Weekly
14 hours ago
- Al-Ahram Weekly
Gaza hospital says 21 children dead from malnutrition and starvation - War on Gaza
The head of Gaza's largest hospital on Tuesday said 21 children have died due to malnutrition and starvation in the Palestinian territory in the past three days, while Israel pressed a devastating assault. Gaza's population of more than two million people is facing severe shortages of food and other essentials, with residents frequently killed as they try to collect humanitarian aid at a handful of distribution points. "Twenty-one children have died due to malnutrition and starvation in various areas across the Gaza Strip," Mohammed Abu Salmiya, the director of Al-Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza, told reporters. Abu Salmiya said new cases of malnutrition and starvation were arriving at Gaza's remaining functioning hospitals "every moment" warning there could be "alarming numbers" of deaths due to starvation. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called Gaza a "horror show" in a speech on Tuesday, with "a level of death and destruction without parallel in recent times". After talks to extend a six-week ceasefire broke down, Israel imposed a full blockade on Gaza on March 2 this year, allowing nothing in until trucks were again permitted to enter at a trickle in late May. However, stocks accumulated during the ceasefire have gradually depleted, leaving the territory's inhabitants experiencing the worst shortages since the start of the war in October 2023. Chaotic scenes have become frequent at aid distribution areas since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation effectively sidelined a vast UN aid delivery network in Gaza. The UN on Tuesday said Israeli forces had killed over 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food aid since the GHF began its operations in late May, with most near the foundation's sites. Israeli military spokesman Nadav Shoshani posted a video online on Tuesday evening, showing what he said was "950 trucks worth of aid currently waiting in Gaza for international organisations to pick up and distribute". "This is after Israel facilitated the aid entry into Gaza," he wrote on X. 🎥 WATCH: 950 trucks worth of aid, currently waiting in Gaza❗️for international organizations to pick up and distribute to Gazan civilians. This is after Israel facilitated the aid entry into Gaza. — LTC Nadav Shoshani (@LTC_Shoshani) July 22, 2025 Latest attacks Earlier Tuesday, Gaza's civil defence agency said Israeli strikes had killed 15 people, after the World Health Organization said Israel attacked its facilities amid its expanding ground operations. Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that Israeli strikes on the Al-Shati camp west of Gaza City had killed at least 13 people and wounded more than 50. Most of Gaza's population has been displaced at least once during the conflict and the Al-Shati camp, on the Mediterranean coast, hosts thousands of people displaced from the north in tents and makeshift shelters. Raed Bakr, 30, lives with his three children and said he heard "a massive explosion" at about 1:40 am on Tuesday (2240 GMT Monday), which blew their tent away. "I felt like I was in a nightmare. Fire, dust, smoke and body parts flying through the air, dirt everywhere. The children were screaming," Bakr, whose wife was killed last year, told AFP. Reports of the latest death toll came as the Roman Catholic church's most senior cleric in the Holy Land, Latin Patriarch Pierbattista Pizzaballa, said the humanitarian situation in Gaza was "morally unacceptable". Pizzaballa spent three days in Gaza after an Israeli strike on the territory's only Catholic church last Thursday which killed three people. New ground operations WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus accused Israeli troops of entering its staff residence, and forcing women and children to evacuate, as they handcuffed, stripped and interrogated male staff at gunpoint. Israeli forces meanwhile expanded ground operations in Deir el-Balah following intense shelling of the area in central Gaza on Monday. The civil defence agency's Bassal said two people were killed in Deir el-Balah. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated that between 50,000 and 80,000 people were living in the area, which until now had been considered relatively safe. Some 30,000 were living in displacement sites. OCHA said nearly 88 percent of the entire Gaza Strip was now either under evacuation orders or within Israeli militarised zones, forcing the population of 2.4 million into an ever-shrinking space. Despite what Guterres described as "devastation... upon devastation", Israeli far-right leaders met in Jerusalem to discuss plans for redeveloping Gaza as a tourist-friendly "riviera", with a permanent Jewish presence. A "master plan" presented at the Knesset, Israel's parliament, foresees the construction of housing for 1.2 million new Jewish residents and the development of industrial and agricultural zones, as well as tourism complexes on the coast. Since 7 October 2023, Israel's genocidal war in Gaza has killed at least 59,106 Palestinians, most of them women and children, with more than 142,511 others wounded, according to the Palestinian health ministry. * This story was edited by Ahram Online. Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
Mid East Info
2 days ago
- Mid East Info
Ministry of Finance and Federal Tax Authority Announce Amendment to Excise Tax on Sugar Sweetened Beverages Through Introduction of a Tiered Volumetric Model
The Ministry of Finance and the Federal Tax Authority FTA have announced an amendment to the excise tax mechanism applied to sugar sweetened beverages (SSB's), introducing a tiered volumetric model that links the tax value on each litre of a sugar sweetened beverage to its sugar content per 100ml. The higher the sugar content per 100ml, the higher the tax per litre, marking a shift from the flat rate currently applied to these beverages. This amendment is part of the UAE's broader efforts to promote public health, reduce the consumption of high-sugar products, and encourage manufacturers to lower sugar levels in their beverages. The announcement follows a proactive approach aimed at providing suppliers, importers, and stakeholders sufficient time to prepare for the upcoming changes. This includes updating internal systems, reviewing product formulations, and ensuring that their records with the Federal Tax Authority are aligned with the requirements of the enhanced model. The updated mechanism is scheduled to take effect at the beginning of 2026, pending the issuance of the relevant implementing legislation. The Ministry of Finance stated that this enhanced model reflects the UAE's commitment to adopting flexible financial and legislative tools that promote healthy lifestyles. Unlike the previous model, which was based on product classification, the new system ties the tax rate directly to the level of sugar content, and by extension, to the associated health impact. This approach incentivises manufacturers to reduce sugar levels and empowers consumers to make more informed dietary choices. This direction also supports efforts to strengthen Gulf-wide tax policy integration and reinforces the use of taxation as a strategic tool to advance sustainable development goals. The Ministry confirmed that comprehensive awareness campaigns will be launched—jointly with the Federal Tax Authority and relevant health and regulatory entities—to ensure a smooth transition and full readiness across the business ecosystem once the legislative tool is in place. Notably, the system was developed in close coordination with the Ministry of Health and Prevention to ensure alignment with national health objectives and to deliver measurable improvements in dietary consumption patterns. Businesses across the UAE will be granted sufficient time to prepare for the implementation of the new mechanism. Additional details will be announced in the coming period to support businesses in achieving full compliance with the updated policy.
