New Global Commitment to Close the Financing Gap for Sustainable Development
In a major breakthrough for health promotion and sustainable development, the final outcome document of the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) includes a commitment to raising alcohol taxation. According to the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), this comes after persistent advocacy from civil society organisations and key champion countries. Movendi International has been advocating for the inclusion of alcohol taxation in the development financing agenda for a decade.
The outcome document, titled the Compromiso de Sevilla, was approved on June 17, 2025, and will be adopted at the FfD4 conference taking place from June 30 to July 3 in Seville, Spain.
Multilateralism works and delivers for all.”
Li Junhua, Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations
This marks a significant shift from ten years ago. In 2015, the Addis Ababa Action Agenda (AAAA), adopted during the FfD3 conference, failed to include alcohol taxation as a recommended domestic resource mobilisation tool. Despite dedicated advocacy from Movendi International, only tobacco taxation was explicitly included in the AAAA, and the potential of alcohol taxation for financing sustainable development remained ignored.
Clear Policy Recognition of Alcohol Taxation
The inclusion of alcohol taxation in the FfD4 outcome document represents a win for evidence-based policy. The document outlines a renewed global framework for financing development and contains specific provisions on domestic public resource mobilisation. These include fiscal policy tools such as health promotion taxes on harmful products as alcohol, which are vital for closing the US$ 4 trillion annual financing gap for sustainable development.
For the first time in a global financing framework, alcohol taxation is explicitly referenced alongside tobacco taxation. The Compromiso de Sevilla states:
We will consider introducing or increasing taxes on tobacco, and alcohol, as a nondistortionary tax source with a clear potential to increase domestic revenue and reduce the risk factors of non-communicable diseases, in line with national circumstances.”
Compromiso de Sevilla, Fiscal systems and sustainable development, Section F
According to the co-facilitators’ letter dated June 16, 2025, the final agreement is “balanced, ambitious, and action-oriented.” They emphasised that implementing the outcome will help reform the international financial architecture, lower borrowing costs, and unlock larger investments in sustainable development.
Why Alcohol Taxation Matters: The Quadruple Win of Alcohol Taxation
Alcohol taxation is more than a fiscal policy – it’s a powerful, proven tool for transforming societies. While often framed as a win-win or triple win, the full potential of raising alcohol excise taxation is best captured in its quadruple win:
- Prevent and reduce harm: Raising alcohol taxes is the single most cost-effective alcohol policy solution to directly lower population-level alcohol consumption and the wide range of harms and costs it causes – violence, injuries, cancer, liver and heart disease, mental ill-health, and premature deaths. It prevents suffering, saves lives, and protects families and communities.
- Generate revenue: Alcohol taxation is a cost-effective measure for governments to increase domestic revenues. The potential of alcohol taxation to bring in reliable and substantial funds often exceeds those from tobacco or sugar-sweetened beverage taxes.
- Finance health and development priorities: The revenues raised can be (soft) earmarked or strategically allocated to finance health systems, prevention and health promotion programs, education, or other vital public services, such as better enforcement and scientific evaluation of alcohol policies. This way alcohol taxation helps fund public goods and human development.
- Advance health equity and social justice: Alcohol harm disproportionately affects people in vulnerable and marginalized communities with low socio-economic status. Preventing and reducing alcohol harm benefits them the most and redirecting revenues toward public goods contributes to reducing health inequalities. Alcohol taxation is a rights-based, pro-equity policy that promotes social justice and strengthens the social contract by prioritizing people’s welfare over alcohol industry profit interests.
Communities have long advocated for the use of alcohol taxation as a high-impact, cost-effective tool for domestic resource mobilisation. The potential of alcohol taxation to do good is substantial:
For instance, a global study estimated that increasing alcohol taxes globally by just 20% could generate additional revenue over US$ 9.4 trillion over 50 years – resources that could be used to fund healthcare, education, and social protection.
In 2024, the Task Force on Fiscal Policy for Health released a landmark report, “Health Taxes: A Compelling Policy for the Crises of Today.” It illustrates the significant potential of raising pro-health taxes for saving lives and it shows that raising alcohol taxes has the biggest potential for revenue generation. to invest in programs and services for people.
The Copenhagen Consensus Center released a landmark study in 2023. It identified 30 cost-effective interventions to achieve the SDGs in the fastest way possible. Analysis showed that the alcohol policy best buys in general and alcohol taxation on its own ranked second and third most effective out of all 30 interventions.
Implementing the alcohol policy best buys could prevent 150,000 deaths caused by alcohol in the next ten years. For every dollar spent on alcohol taxation alone, a country could generate social benefits worth $53.
A Movendi International analysis and infographic illustrates another reason why alcohol taxation matters in the sustainable development agenda: the vast and growing evidence that alcohol taxation directly drives progress towards multiple sustainable development goals, at least ten, and benefits all three dimensions of sustainable development – the social, economic, and environmental dimensions.
A Collective Advocacy Success in Line With Public Opinion
The Compromiso de Sevilla corrects a long-standing gap in global development financing frameworks. Its recognition of alcohol taxation reflects growing momentum to use proven solutions to prevent and reduce alcohol harm, costs, and generate much needed additional revenue.
The inclusion of alcohol taxation was not guaranteed. Neither the zero draft nor the first draft of the outcome document referenced it concretely. Including alcohol taxation in the FfD4 conference outcome document has been a key priority for Movendi International. The clear and distinct reference to alcohol taxes is a result of coordinated advocacy work and political leadership by champion countries.
The final approval of the Compromiso de Sevilla sends a strong signal. As Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Li Junhua stated, as per IISD reporting, the outcome shows that “multilateralism works and delivers for all.” It also reaffirms international consensus that alcohol harm needs to be addressed as part of global development and financing strategies.
The inclusion of alcohol taxation in the FfD4 outcome document sets a powerful precedent. It opens the door for countries to adopt evidence-based measures that protect people and societies from preventable harm, and that advance health, development, and social justice. With this global endorsement, alcohol taxation now has stronger legitimacy as a tool for financing the 2030 Agenda.
The inclusion of alcohol taxation in the FfD4 outcome document is also important because it aligns with robust public support for raising alcohol taxes around the world.
In 2022, a Gallup poll showed high and broad support for alcohol tax increases among the world’s adult population. And since then, representative surveys conducted on behalf of the RESET Alcohol Initiative revealed striking results: People are gravely concerned about alcohol harm. And people desire alcohol policy change. They want their governments to take alcohol policy action and to hold the alcohol industry accountable for the harms alcohol is causing.
A majority of the adult population supports raising alcohol taxes in nine countries in the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Africa, and the Eastern Mediterranean regions.
