ADACT have been informed of a range of new regulations which are are being proposed for goods sold in the Belgium market. A summary of the proposed regulations includes:
- Nicotine free products are to be considered ‘usual’ rather than ‘similar’ which appears to mean that they would come under the same regulation as nicotine containing products in Belgium
- Zero nicotine products are covered by the advertising ban.
- Ban on sale of zero nicotine products to children.
- Ban on smoking/vaping applies to zero nicotine products.
- Belgium requires a local representative for the notifications that takes responsibility – an EU representative would not be sufficient.
- Labelling, packaging and leaflets will need to be uploaded with the notification.
- Belgium will be adopting a positive list similar to the UK list and products not on the list cannot be sold.
- Updates and changes to notifications will attract a notification fee (There will be three levels of fees depending on the nature of the update).
- A notification fee of €200 is proposed.
- An annual renewal fee of €50 is also proposed.
- Annual data would need to be submitted before 1 March of each year.
- Special lighting effects on devices will be banned and product must not be made attractive.
- Possible ban on CBD vapes.
- New regulations will be based on the precautionary principle, which is do no chance of harm, which usually means an extreme risk averse approach at the expense of risk prevention.
- No distance (I.e. online) sales will be required.
- All products must comply with ISO8317:2003 for child resistant packaging.
- EC-IDs on packaging.
A public consultation is due to take place on 10 February 2023 and we advise you to take this opportunity to share your views by emailing [email protected]
To discuss how the proposed changes could affect your brand, please call +44(0)1302 986 088 or email [email protected]