Germany drops Coke Zero from sugar tax plan

Germany has dropped plans to include Coke Zero and other sugar-free drinks in a planned sugar tax after pushback inside the governing coalition and from businesses.

Europe’s biggest economy is set to introduce a tax on sugary drinks next year to raise money for its under-pressure health system. Proposals circulating earlier this week would have widened the levy to include artificially sweetened soft drinks, flavoured milk drinks and alcohol-free wine and beer.

Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil said on Wednesday that sugar-free drinks would not be included. “As finance minister I will not present a tax under which sugar-free drinks are taxed,” he told reporters after a cabinet meeting in Neuhardenberg, outside Berlin. “I think that's nonsense, if I can put it bluntly.”

Klingbeil had earlier posted on Instagram: “Sugar tax on Zero?... NO!”

The details of the new levy are still being prepared. When Germany’s coalition initially agreed to the tax, it estimated that it could bring in about 650 million euros, or $760 million, a year.