Following a recent Senate vote of 8-7 opposing the reduction of taxes on artificial sweeteners, which includes high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri said the proposal, put forward by Senator Ralph Recto, would have put HFCS on “equal footing with sugar.”

“If we [reduce taxes on HFCS], the sugar industry will die [since] imported HFCS is so cheap,” the senator from Bukidnon explained. “If you [set] the same taxes as local sugar, all [companies] will shift to [HFCS]; that will spell the nail in the coffin of the sugar industry.”

He affirmed, taxes on sugar stays at P5, and P10 on HFCS.

However, Zubiri noted, “The fight is not over [until] the end of the period of amendments.”

Also voting in opposition were Senators Juan Edgardo ‘Sonny’ Angara, Jr., JV Ejercito, Sherwin Gatchalian, Panfilo Lacson, Aquilino Pimentel III, Joel Villanueva, and Risa Hontiveros./DGB, WDJ