Pepsi plans to cut sugar, but your cola will probably still make you fat

Pepsi is pouring on an aggressive sugar-cutting campaign over the next decade — but it’s not a pass to guzzle soda guilt-free just yet.

The $63 billion New York-based food and beverage giant pledged Monday to reduce the sugar in its soft drinks so that, by 2025, two-thirds will have just 100 calories or fewer from added sugars per 12-ounce servings.

This follows the World Health Organization’s call for a 20% to 50% soda tax to stem the rise of global obesity and diabetes just last week.

“Informed by the latest dietary guidelines of the World Health Organization and other authorities, the company will continue to refine its food and beverage choices to meet changing consumer needs by reducing added sugars, saturated fat and sodium levels in its product portfolio,” PepsiCo announced.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean your go-to can of soda is dumping all of its sugar. While PepsiCo will be reformulating some of its classic sweetened drinks, a rep told the Daily News that this overall low-sugar target will also be met by investing in low and zero-calorie beverages, like bottled water, diet drinks and unsweetened teas and juices. And PepsiCo will sell full-sugar drinks in smaller packages that only hold 100-calorie portions.

So it’s not that a can of Pepsi is necessarily getting healthier, but that a greater percentage of the company’s drink menu, which includes Gatorade, Tropicana, Pure Leaf tea and Naked Juice, will have less sugar and fewer calories. Or your guilty pleasures will be packaged in smaller portions.

“We already have more than 300 beverages from zero to less than 100 calories,” said Jay Cooney, senior vice president of communications at PepsiCo. “We’re just providing customers with more options than they had in the past. So for example, if you want iced tea, there’s everything from Pure Leaf unsweetened tea to extra sweet tea.”

So buyer beware: You’re still responsible for making your own healthy choices.

PepsiCo is also targeting its snacks, which include Frito-Lay Doritos and Cheetos, Quaker oats and Sabra hummus, so that three-quarters of its eats won’t exceed 1.1 grams of saturated fat per 100 calories. Foods will also stay under 1.3 milligrams of sodium per calorie.

 

Cooney was mum on which drinks and snacks in particular will be reformulated, or how much the company will spend on this 10-year plan. The Financial Times estimates the costs will run in the millions, as PepsiCo’s research and development budget for 2015 was $754 million.

Rival company Coca Cola is also appealing to more health-conscious customers by vowing to offer low-calorie or no-calorie beverage options in every one of its 200 markets by 2020.