From the end of next year, pre-packaged non-alcoholic drinks with a high sugar or saturated fat content will be required to display a nutrition label with grades from "A" to "D", with "D" being the unhealthiest.

Retailers will also be banned from advertising grade "D" drinks on all media platforms.

The same measures will next be applied to freshly prepared drinks, such as those from bubble tea chains, traditional medicine halls and smoothie chains.

These moves, announced yesterday by Senior Minister of State for Health Edwin Tong - along with the installation of more water dispensers in public spaces to coax people to drink plain water - are part of Singapore's war on diabetes.

About 19,000 people here are diagnosed with diabetes each year.

Mr Tong, speaking during the debate on his ministry's budget, elaborated on the rules on labelling and advertising restrictions.

Known as "Nutri-Grade", the nutrient summary label will have four colour-coded grades from green to red, with letters reflecting the sugar and saturated fat content. The sugar content will also be displayed.

Drinks with "A", the healthiest grade, must have 1g or less of sugar and 0.7g or less of saturated fat per 100ml, and contain no sweetener. These include water, skimmed milk and unsweetened teas.

Drinks with "D", the unhealthiest grade, have more than 10g of sugar or 2.8g of saturated fat per 100ml. These include juice drinks, soft drinks and energy drinks.

The rating is accorded to the highest content of the specified ingredients. For instance, a drink with less than 1g of sugar but more than 2.8g of saturated fat would be rated "D" despite its low sugar content, but a drink with more than 10g of sugar and less than 0.7g of saturated fat would also receive a "D" rating despite its low fat content.

The label is mandatory for drinks with a "C" or "D" grade. About 70 per cent of pre-packaged drinks in Singapore fall into this category.

Advertising of grade "D" drinks will be permitted at retail points of sale, but nowhere else.

The labels and advertising restrictions were first announced by Mr Tong last October, without an implementation date. Neither did it encompass freshly prepared drinks.

But such drinks have become "a substantial and growing source of sugar intake for many Singaporeans", he noted.

Small businesses with one or two stalls, like those in hawker centres, will not be affected by the regulations initially, but this may change as the situation develops, he said.

The Health Ministry and Health Promotion Board will continue to engage the industry in the coming months to better understand the issue and determine how best to implement the measures, he added.

To give consumers a healthier alternative, the Government has been increasing the number of water dispensers across the island. By the middle of this year, water dispensers will be available at all hawker centres here, as well as more than a dozen bus interchanges and terminals.

Professor Teo Yik Ying, dean of the Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore, said the grading system "will clearly send an indication to the industry that there's a need to reformulate so their drinks don't fall into the unhealthy bands of 'C' and 'D'". "But equally, there'll be a signalling to the public, to remind them which products are healthier and less healthy."

However, it is not the final instrument. "If after a couple of years of evaluation, the situation doesn't improve, there may be a need to implement a sugar tax... something governments (elsewhere) have done."