Food Policy

Our Work

For the last five years, we’ve worked with civil society organizations in Brazil, Barbados, Colombia, Jamaica and South Africa to mobilize citizens to call on their governments to pass these policies. Through our Advocacy Fund and Legal Defense Fund, we help organizations and governments promote and defend their healthy food policy initiatives. We support to advocacy to:

• Enact taxes on sugary drinks and unhealthy foods.
• Add mandatory Front of Package Warning Labels to help consumers identify unhealthy food and choose healthier alternatives.
• Remove unhealthy food and beverages from public sector facilities, especially schools.
• Restrict marketing of unhealthy food and beverages to children.

Where we work:

Our focus countries: Barbados, Brazil, Colombia, Jamaica, South Africa
Our Advocacy Fund countries: Argentina, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Pakistan, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Uruguay

Advocacy and Legal Defense Funds

In addition, our Advocacy Fund expands the reach of the program globally by supporting organizations outside of the focus countries. The fund identifies policy initiatives that require short-term advocacy support to pass promising healthy food policy legislation or regulations.

Our Healthy Food Policy Legal Defense Fund helps governments defend strong, evidence-based healthy food measures against legal challenges brought by well-resourced companies or industry bodies.

Our Impact

• 2017: Colombia’s Constitutional Court affirmed the right to air public health messages on TV in the face of government censorship and industry opposition that prevented their broadcast.
• 2018: South Africa enacted a tax on sugary beverages through the Health Promotion Levy.
• 2019: Jamaica implemented a restriction on sugar-sweetened beverages in schools.

Success Story: Taxing Sugary Drinks to Improve Health

The challenge:

Sugary drinks contribute to a South African health epidemic in which obesity-related diseases like heart attack and stroke account for more than half of the country’s deaths. Diabetes alone takes more than 25,000 lives a year.

GHAI’s role:

The Global Health Advocacy Incubator supported local partners to develop a comprehensive campaign strategy to advocate for a sugary beverage tax proposed by the Finance Minister. Evidence shows that taxing sugary beverages drives down consumption and improves health.

Results:

Parliament passed the new Health Promotion Levy, and the President signed it into law in 2017. The tax went into effect in April 2018. GHAI continues to work with local partners to push for a broader set of policies to address obesity and its related diseases. Taxes on sugary drinks have been an effective way to reduce the consumption of sugary drinks as evidenced by similar taxes in other geographies.