This article by Montserrat Antúnez originally appeared in the October 13, 2025 edition of Sin Embargo. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Mexico Solidarity Project.
Mexico City. The soft drink company Coca-Cola, represented in turn by the Mexican Beverage Association, which also includes brands such as Pepsi and Grupo Peñafiel, as well as the National Association of Small Merchants (ANPEC), has been leading strategies in recent weeks to disseminate information without scientific support and thereby avoid the tax on soft drinks and sugary drinks proposed by the federal government.
Last week, during a debate in the Chamber of Deputies, the associations and Patricio Caso, Director of Public Affairs for Coca-Cola and Vice President of the Confederation of Industrial Chambers (Concamin), opposed the Revenue Law, which proposes increasing the tax on sugary drinks from 1 to 3 pesos per liter. Coca-Cola has a history of opposing , through lobbying and injunctions, public policies that protect health, such as front-of-package warning labels. During the forum, organized by the Finance Commission, both Caso and ANPEC (National Association of Consumers) disqualified the organization El Poder del Consumidor, the promoter of the labeling.
“[Representatives of the soft drink industry] are trying to divert attention. Something that is very surprising, and that we haven’t seen either nationally or internationally, is that a Coca-Cola official would publicly attack the regulation and make direct, personal attacks. For a Coca-Cola official to go to Congress and take this type of stance is something we’ve never seen before. Coca-Cola opposes these policies and does so through associations like the Mexican Beverage Association and through many other media outlets, such as public relations agencies that have contact with columnists, but we’ve never seen this attitude before,” warned Alejandro Calvillo, director of El Poder del Consumidor, in an interview.
The Mexican Beverage Association represents Coca-Cola and brands such as Pepsi and Grupo Peñafiel.
At the forum held on October 7, Patricio Caso, a former Cofepris official during Enrique Peña Nieto’s administration but now working for Coca-Cola, criticized the fact that the tax proposed by President Claudia Sheinbaum also includes applying it to beverages sweetened with non-caloric sweeteners, which are used in products labeled as “diet” or “light.” He charged that this will impact consumers’ finances.
The soft drink industry seeks to evade the tax on products that use these sweeteners by promoting them as a healthier alternative, but since 2023, the World Health Organization (WHO) has advised against their use as an alternative for weight control. Although it said there are no conclusive results yet, the organization found that prolonged consumption could increase the risk of type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and mortality in adults.
Calvillo asserts that avoiding taxes on products that use these substances is just another strategy used by soft drink companies to put their economic interests before the health of the population. In addition, in early October, Coca-Cola delivery drivers delivered a call signed by ANPEC to grocery stores in Puebla urging workers to protest the tax by closing their businesses for a few minutes, as documented by the newspaper La Jornada.
ANPEC’s arguments have focused on warning about an impact on jobs, but El Poder del Consumidor recalled that the results of the report “Changes in employment associated with the introduction of taxes on sugary drinks and non-essential foods with high energy density”, published in the scientific journal PubMed in 2017, showed that there were no reductions in employment associated with the taxes implemented in Mexico in 2014 on sugary drinks and non-essential foods with high energy density.
“This isn’t unique to Mexico. While it’s very important to have our own evidence, there are similar results in studies conducted in other countries. For example, Chile had no impact on jobs or wages, but it did have an impact on sales of these taxed products. The same is true in the United States. So, these types of arguments alleging economic impacts are more like tactics to delay the implementation of taxes,” said Doré Castillo, coordinator of ContraPeso, in an interview.
Based on its own unpublished survey, ANPEC argues that the soda tax closed 30,000 small shops in 2014, but it does not comment on the impact of the increase in Oxxo stores, a chain owned by the Mexican Economic Development Corporation (FEMSA), which has displaced local businesses in recent decades.
OXXO X-Ray: Products That Make Your Life Sick published last year by El Poder del Consumidor estimated that the company has managed to open one every 14 hours, staying just eight minutes away from its potential customers.
Industry Denies International Support
The WHO launched the “3 by 35” initiative on July 2, calling on countries to increase real prices for tobacco, alcohol, and sugary drinks by at least 50 percent by 2035 through health taxes to curb chronic diseases and generate more public revenue. UNICEF, the World Bank, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) have also spoken out in favor of such taxes.
But the Mexican Beverage Association insists on denying this information, asserting that the Sheinbaum administration’s decision is not endorsed by international organizations.
Soft drink industry representatives have also repeatedly stated in interviews and forums that there is no evidence of the tax’s positive results, but a study by Mexico’s National Institute of Public Health and the University of North Carolina showed a reduction in purchases of these beverages in the first year (2014) and that these were further reduced, reaching a 9.7 percent reduction in 2015.
Doré Castillo and Alejandro Calvillo celebrated the Mexican President’s defense of the soda tax and the allocation of the proceeds to a health fund, citing the fact that soda consumption is behind the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, and other chronic diseases.
Mexico tops the list of the 30 most populous countries in the world with the highest number of new diabetes cases attributable to the consumption of soft drinks and other sugary beverages. In the country, it is estimated that one in three new diabetes cases is due to the consumption of sugary drinks, according to research published in the scientific journal Nature Medicine in January.
“This information needs to reach the population. We have to [work to] prevent advertising for these products. We have to prevent these products from not only being in schools, but also from being in family settings. We have to prevent high taxes on these products and prevent resources from going to healthcare to prevent and address the harm their consumption is causing,” Alejandro Calvillo emphasized.
Montserrat Antúnez is a journalist committed to communicating issues related to access to justice, conflicts of interest, and human rights, host of the program In Defense of the Consumer and the news program Dos con Todo*, alongside Dulce Olvera.*
Basic Grains at the Crossroads
October 14, 2025
The loss of domestic production translates into greater dependence on the United States.
Threats, Lobbying, & Manipulation: Coca Cola Pulls Out Arsenal to Fight Tax
October 14, 2025October 14, 2025
Soft drink companies, with the help of front groups, have been spreading false information and denying scientific evidence about the harm their products cause, in an attempt to stop an upcoming tax.
Continental Meeting of Solidarity with Cuba ends with Demand to end Genocidal Blockade, Support for Venezuela
October 14, 2025
This article by Emir Olivares Alonso originally appeared in the October 13, 2025 edition of La Jornada, Mexico’s premier left wing daily newspaper. Dozens of delegates from 35 countries demanded that the United States government and Congress end the “genocidal” economic, commercial, and financial blockade of Cuba. In the final declaration of the Ninth Continental…
The post Threats, Lobbying, & Manipulation: Coca Cola Pulls Out Arsenal to Fight Tax appeared first on Mexico Solidarity Media.
From Mexico Solidarity Media via this RSS feed