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Consumer Demand and Market Response to Added Sugar Labeling: Evidence From the Updated Nutrition Facts Panel

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Agribusiness

Published online on

Abstract

["Agribusiness, EarlyView. ", "\nABSTRACT\nThis paper examines how mandatory disclosure of added sugar content on the updated U.S. Nutrition Facts Panel (NFP) affects consumer demand and market outcomes. Using NielsenIQ Retail Scanner Data (2015–2020) and a random coefficient discrete choice model, we estimate how added sugar labeling influences purchasing behavior in yogurt and cookie markets. We find that separate disclosure of added sugar reduces demand for products with higher added sugar content in both categories. Counterfactual simulations show that the revised NFP produced meaningful reductions in both total and added sugar consumption relative to a no‐label‐change scenario, and that a targeted sugar tax applied only to products with added sugar achieves similar reductions in added sugar consumption as a broad‐based tax on all sugar content, while encouraging within‐category substitution toward lower‐added‐sugar alternatives rather than reducing category sales uniformly. These findings illustrate how labeling reforms and fiscal policy can operate as complementary policy instruments, and they suggest that information disclosure on the revised NFP expands the set of tax designs available to policymakers targeting added sugar consumption.\n"]