Latvia has implemented tough new restrictions on vapes and other safer nicotine alternatives to smoking. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
From January 1, vape flavours are banned in the Baltic country, with the exception of tobacco. Pouches also have a limit on the level of nicotine they can contain. All tobacco products, vapes and nicotine pouches cannot now be legally sold to people aged under 20. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Anyone caught breaking the new law will face a hefty fine ranging from \u20ac280 to \u20ac700 for an individual and \u20ac700 to \u20ac7,100 euros for a business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The law \u2018will backfire\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Traditional and Smokeless Tobacco Products Association in Latvia, which has opposed the new legislation since its proposal, warns that it will backfire as people will simply buy vapes elsewhere or illegally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I assume that, similarly to other products, relatives, and friends who travel will be able to bring them from abroad\u201d, Anrijs Matiss, a board member of the organisation, told Latvian public TV station Latvijas Telev\u012bzija. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cLike all illegal things, Telegram trading [buying through the messaging platform\u2019s online marketplace] will probably also develop. And it\u2019s hard to stop.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n An investigation by Latvijas Telev\u012bzija also revealed that many companies that have previously sold refill cartridges are looking for loopholes to circumvent the law, meaning it will have little effect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The broadcaster found one company is planning to sell separate bottles of nicotine and flavouring for customers to mix themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Certainly, after the New Year, there will be alternatives that can be offered to the client, but they will not have such a wide range,\u201d Jekaterina Smirnova, of vape company Ecodumas, said. \u201cLet\u2019s increase the range bit by bit and, after some time, it will definitely be bigger.” <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, the nicotine pouch industry – which is forced to reduce nicotine content in its products – expects that products will disappear from store shelves, at least temporarily, according to the broadcaster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Vape brand makes legal challenge <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Vape brand Pro Vape has made a legal challenge to the new law, which is now being considered by the Constitutional Court of Latvia. Pro Vape is asking the court to consider whether the changes comply with Article 105 of the Constitution, regarding personal property. The company says it has been forced to make major business changes within just a few months, which infringes on its property rights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pro Vape also says the new regulations may make it easier for the illegal market to thrive. It points out that non-tobacco flavoured products account for a massive 90 per cent of the market, meaning the ban is essentially equivalent to a complete prohibition of vapes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Latvia already had some restrictions on vaping in place before the additional new laws. These include a ban on vaping within 10 metres of government buildings, public transport stops, apartment stairwells or corridors, balconies, and around children. Anyone asked to stop vaping near someone else must do so by law. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Loss of \u20ac10 million per year in taxes <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Latvia applies a complicated tax formula to e-liquids that takes into account the amount of nicotine in the bottle: \u20ac0.005 per milligram of nicotine in addition to \u20ac0.01 per millilitre of liquid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There is also Value Added Tax (VAT) of 21 per cent on the final retail price.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Traditional and Smokeless Tobacco Products Association estimates that the state budget will lose around \u20ac10 million a year in taxes following the new laws. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The European Union’s Beating Cancer Plan aims to achieve a “tobacco-free generation” by 2040. For this, it has set a target of a 30 per cent reduction in tobacco use by 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, mounting evidence from countries including Australia, Brazil and Mexico shows that prohibiting vapes simply fuels a dangerous black market and can turn people back to smoking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, countries that are encouraging the use of regulated vapes as an alternative to smoking, such as Sweden, have seen smoking rates plummet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Latvia has implemented tough new restrictions on vapes and other safer nicotine alternatives to smoking. From January 1, vape flavours are banned in the Baltic country, with the exception of tobacco. Pouches also have a limit on the level of nicotine they…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":990002,"featured_media":20084,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[258,257],"tags":[27,329,186,333,29],"slider":[202],"class_list":["post-20083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-legislation","category-news","tag-article","tag-european-union","tag-nicotine","tag-sweden","tag-travel","slider-slider-1"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/990002"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20083"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20083\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20092,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20083\/revisions\/20092"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20083"},{"taxonomy":"slider","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clearingtheair.eu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/slider?post=20083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n