The European soft drinks industry, represented by UNESDA, announced in June 2021 new and enhanced health and nutrition commitments, including a new pledge to reduce average added sugars in soft drinks by another 10% from 2019-2025 across the EU-27 and the UK.
This will represent a 33% overall reduction in average added sugars over the last two decades, building on past sugar reduction milestones that the industry achieved from 2015 to 2019 (14.6% reduction on average) and from 2000 to 2015 (13.3% reduction on average).
This shows the industry’s ongoing efforts to encourage healthier diets and meet changing consumer preferences for lower intake of sugars and calories.
The sugar reduction will be achieved through a wide range of accelerated actions, including:
- reformulating existing products whilst maintaining taste;
- innovating to develop new no- or low-calorie products;
- increasing the availability and range of smaller pack sizes to enable moderate consumption;
- promoting no or low-calorie soft drinks to encourage consumer choice towards these products.
