Fifteen Countries Urge EU to Update Tobacco Tax Rules

A group of 15 finance ministers are urging the European Commission to update the EU’s excise tax rules to include new products like heated tobacco and e-cigarettes.

In a letter dated May 26 and seen by Bloomberg, the finance ministers representing countries including France, Germany and the Netherlands, demanded Commission President Ursula von der Leyen “take without delay the necessary steps in order to update” the bloc’s tobacco tax rules.

Those rules haven’t been updated since 2011, and leave out new products like nicotine pouches and vapes that have entered the market since, leading to “fragmentation, an uneven ...