Pascual Cooperative asks to reconsider the increase in taxes on sugary drinks

Andrea Becerril

La Jornada Newspaper
Saturday, October 25, 2025, p. 6

Legal representatives of the Pascual Workers’ Cooperative demanded that Morena senators not apply the Special Tax on Production and Service (IEPS) to sugary drinks, approved in the Chamber of Deputies, because the increase in the consumer price will reduce their sales and practically take them out of the market.

Their legal advisor, José Luis Sánchez, stated that they have had meetings with legislators, since they are “very concerned” about the impact of this tax of more than three pesos per liter of soft drink, since it will have much more negative effects than in the rest of the large soft drink companies.

“We are a 100 percent Mexican company,” managed for more than 40 years by its workers, which makes Boing and its other products with cane sugar and fresh fruit pulp, so they contain less sweet, but which will have a very difficult time coping with the decline in sales.

He explained that soft drink consortia use high fructose for their drinks, which represents costs 40 percent lower than Pascual’s. Likewise, Pascual is the only one that pays the Value Added Tax (VAT), because all the other soft drinks companies took cover to evade it. “Last year we delivered 1,500 million pesos to the treasury for this tax and the ISR,” he explained.

In a letter addressed to the Senate, they propose leaving the IEPES at the current amount, 1.64 pesos per liter, “in the case of beverages sweetened with 100 percent cane sugar, containing fruits and/or vegetables or fruit and vegetable juice.” They argue that, otherwise, “national companies that operate under principles of social responsibility and solidarity with Mexico will no longer be viable.”

The legislators’ response is that it is “very difficult” to introduce the modification they propose. “We hope for some other alternative so that the cooperative does not sink,” they noted.