 Now, health experts, of course, for increase in taxes paid on sugar-sweetened beverage from the current tenare to a hundred and thirteen are in order to discourage excessive consumption by members of the public. Addressing Apprentice Conference in Lagos, Executive Director of Corporate Accountability and Public Participation in Afrika Kappa, Kim Boddi Uluwa Femi, disclosed that 99% of illnesses are as a result of excessive consumption of sugar-sweetened beverage. Plos Thevenise correspondent Lovie Kugoye-Dukun was there and brings us details in this report. For more than two hours, these men of the media profession emerged in this official launch of the research report on sugar-sweetened beverage, SSB Taxi Nigeria, organized by Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa Kappa. The aim is for them to have firsthand information on the outcome of the research on the potential fiscal and public health effects of sugar-sweetened beverage tasks in Nigeria. According to the group, the report is a comprehensive analysis of the SSB tax, including the potential impact on both the fiscal landscape and public health outcomes in Nigeria. A Kim Boddi Uluwa Femi, Executive Director of Kappa. Highlighting more on the report, he calls on Nigeria's re-engage in healthy lifestyles by consumers of what is destructive to the body. That tax is not just for government and revenue. It is to protect the Nigerian citizens. It is for public health. The tax is to ensure that there is a decrease in the consumption of products that are causing NCDs in Nigeria. Products that cause diabetes, high blood pressure and are also related to the cancers and the rest of them. And so you've got sweet to these tax that will induce reduction in consumption. In his presentation, a research associate, Center for the Studies of Economic of Africa, Fidelis Obanii, calls for an effective SSB tax regime. He holds strongly that it will go a long way in reducing consumption of SSB as well as a boarding of non-communicable diseases while generating revenue for public health initiatives. Normally, economics believe that if you increase tax, the body of that tax will be shifted from the industry to the consumers. But we are also expecting a non-price response. A non-price response in this case is product reformulation. Product reformulation in the sense that the industry will begin to adjust in terms of the content, the content of the ambulance. On her part, Okweyemi Ibituye paints a more gloomy picture on the consequences of too much intake of SSB. In the sense of taking something in your body that won't have any positive effects on your body or in your body. So there is basically no need for us to take sugar drinks. The best you can do is to just up for water or take fresh juices that are free from sugar. Things that are fruit juices that you make at home or juices that you know that you trust the source. And so these are just basically what sugar drinks are. But then when we look at its impact on NCDs, we realize that NCDs, they place a global burden, not just in Nigeria but their global burden on health globally. A Nigerian living with diabetes who continues to consume food will not be able to properly take care of his or herself. And that is just one angle. There is a family member that is taking care of that person who will begin to lose productive hours, who an unpaid caregiver who cannot earn from his or her normal work and can still not earn from giving care to that person. This is why we are saying the SSB tax is the triple main, a win for the individual, a win for the government and a win for the girls. According to the report, Nigeria ranks fourth globally in SSB consumption with an annual sale of approximately 38.6 million litres in a market value at $16.87 billion in 2023. Love Ikuku Uyiduku. Plus TV news. To hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates.