As published in my Op-ed column in Manila Standard Today
A few days ago, BBC News reported that in California, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently signed a law banning the sale of soft drinks in high schools. This law extends a prior law imposing the ban in elementary schools. The move is in response to what Schwarzenegger calls an “obesity epidemic.”
Beginning 2007, only “water, milk and some fruit and sports drinks that contain a controlled amount of sweeteners” will be offered for sale in high schools. The regulation is not limited to drinks. Even food traditionally sold in school cafeterias are likewise affected. For instance, “pizza, burritos, pasta and sandwiches must contain no more than four grams of fat for every 100 calories, with a total of no more than 400 calories.”
Prior to the signing of the new law, Associated Press carried a report quoting Bob Achermann, a lobbyist for the California-Nevada Soft Drink Association, saying that the association would fight the extension of the ban to high schools. He argued that outlawing soft drink sales in school didn’t necessarily prevent teenagers from consuming them during school hours. “They can bring them to school, they can get them after school,” AP quoted Achermann.
The reaction of the soft drinks manufacturers was based on two things: 1) kids form a wide base of the soft drinks market and 2) prohibiting schools from selling to these kids would upset a well-entrenched business arrangement with many schools.
School authorities sign contracts with these companies to allow them to sell their products in the schools. In exchange, the companies pay the schools for the privilege to sell. In short, the anti-obesity laws mean huge losses in income for both the soft drinks manufacturers and the schools.
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