May 27, 2026
Lifting the veil on the unhealthy food lobby in Colombia
Bad diets kill millions of people every year and lead to trillions of dollars in health costs. Communities who are least able to afford it bear most of the burden.
The world’s largest food companies say they want to be part of the solution. But behind closed doors, they are lobbying governments to derail public health laws.
Our series of investigations, with partners on five continents, reveals the global lobbying tactics of food corporations. We are starting this project’s publication with one country, Colombia, where companies producing unhealthy food attempt to influence the May 2026 presidential elections.
In Colombia, more than half of the population is overweight, with tremendous human and economic costs. Treating the diseases caused by unhealthy foods cost Colombia an estimated 1.3 billion euros in 2021. To address this crisis, civil society and members of the congress proposed various policies. In 2022, they pushed a bill to establish a tax on ultra-processed food, including sodas.
Food companies vigorously lobbied against the bill. Our investigation with Cuestión Pública reveals that companies paid for 40% of all donations to political parties that year, adding up to over 5.85 million Euros.
One of the recipients of the donations from food companies was Paloma Valencia, one of the top candidates in the ongoing presidential elections, which begins May 31. She has promised to eliminate the tax if she’s elected president.
Despite the opposition, the tax passed, and it worked: the consumption of unhealthy foods and sugary drinks dropped dramatically. Lawyers, however, moved to the courtroom. 17 legal challenges were filed against the public health measures. Most of the challenges were made by individuals, under a process that enables any Colombian citizen to challenge the constitutionality of laws or policies. So far, they have all been rejected.
METHODS
In order to find who was pushing back against the public health laws, we did a comprehensive search on legal databases and interviews for all legal challenges to the laws. We also obtained and analysed thousands of social media posts to look for the positions of presidential candidates on food policies. We also searched external visits to members of the Congress by people working for or on behalf of food companies.
STORYLINES
The pushback by the ultra-processed food lobby happened behind closed doors. The names of food companies didn’t appear in the court documents, but most of the individuals who filed legal challenges were lawyers who had done work for food companies. Their submissions also used many of the same arguments wielded by the companies against the tax. Three of the legal challenges were filed by a lawyer, Juan Manuel Charry Urueña, who skirted around our question when we asked who paid for this work. In his email to file the constitutional challenge, he copied a major regional manufacturer of sodas. When Cuestión Pública asked him why he copied them, he told the outlet that he was in a conversation with the group because their products were being unfairly taxed at a higher rate. Four of the other legal challenges came from a law firm and three from a former senator.
Unhealthy food has a tremendous impact in Colombia, leading to billions of euros in health costs and human suffering. Cuestión Pública interviewed the parents of children and infants who had serious health complications that specialists attributed to their diet composed of ultra-processed food. Those also contribute to diabetes and a host of related diseases.