The Netherlands flavour prohibition is set to take place on July 2023, killing off 80% of the Netherlands e-liquid market. It’s not all doom and gloom, but certainly terrible news for Dutch vapers.
The Dutch government has announced it will carry out its plan to prohibit all flavours bar tobacco flavours with only a very limited list of allowed ingredients to be used.
Other flavoured products will only allowed to be manufactured until 1 July 2023 and sold until 1 October 2023. This includes both nicotine and zero nicotine products in bottled form, pre-filled pods and disposables. The new rules also prevent manufacturers from using any marketing tactics that refer to anything other than tobacco.
Six European countries have already prohibited non-tobacco flavours including Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary and Lithuania while Ukraines flavour ban will also take effect July 2023.
According to the final rule published on November 28th, only 16 ingredients will be allowed, but manufacturers have already retaliated saying that even with the 16 allowed substances, they are unable to create an accurate copy of what a tobacco flavour should be.
This is sure to put most, if not all Netherlands vape juice manufacturers out of business and will leave consumers either flocking back to combustible tobacco or illegally importing flavoured e-liquid.
This may not be a death knell for vaping in the Netherlands, but it certainly is a massive step backwards and feels like a targeted attack by the tobacco industry.
With Chinese manufacturers already handed a death sentence, only time will tell where we’re headed. Perhaps Innokin is on the right path with their new water based pods; only time will tell.
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