Hoping to curb Mexican consumption of sugary soft drinks, President Enrique Pena Nieto has proposed a peso per liter tax on soda as part of a package of tax reforms.
The public-health conscious measure follows a UN Food & Agriculture Organization report that Mexico has bumped the US to take top (dubious) honors as the most obese among developed nations.
If it passes, the tax is likely to boost sales of bottled water in a market that already leads the world in its per capita consumption (480 liters per person, according to an Inter-American Development Bank’s 2011 study).
Alas, much of the demand for bottled water has been driven by mistrust of public water systems (the revenues from the proposed soda tax would be earmarked to improving this infrastructure). A homegrown industry has sprung up to meet the need for reliably potable water. But multinationals have welcomed the opportunity to make up in Mexico for lost sales in the EU and US, where eco-conscious consumers are giving up the bottled water habit.
Datamyne’s trade data shows a steady post-recession rise in Mexican water imports (HS 2201, 2202), with most of it coming from its NAFTA partner, the US.
Datamyne covers more of the Latin American region’s import-export trade than any other source. Learn more about our coverage here.