Netherlands: sale of tobacco in supermarkets banned from 2024

On Friday, November 20, 2020, the Dutch government announced that the sale of tobacco in supermarkets would be banned in the Netherlands from 2024.

The sale of cigarettes and other tobacco products in supermarkets will be banned in the Netherlands from 2024, the Dutch government announced on Friday 20 November 2020. This is a hugely significant measure, as supermarkets currently account for 55% of all tobacco sales in the country.1].

A decision that adds to a battery of anti-smoking measures

The decision to ban the sale of tobacco products in supermarkets from 2024 is part of a series of tobacco control measures recently taken in the Netherlands. Some of these measures have already been implemented, while others will be implemented soon.

Thus, at the beginning of 2020, smoking areas in all train stations in the country were removed, while those in office buildings will have to disappear by 2022.2].

Since October 2020, plain packaging has been introduced in the Netherlands, and supermarkets can no longer display tobacco products in view of customers, although they are allowed to sell them until the new measure is implemented in 2024[3].

Before that, it will no longer be possible to buy cigarettes from vending machines from 2022[4]. Finally, the purchase of tobacco online will be prohibited from 2023, the year in which the price of a packet of cigarettes will reach 10 euros[5].

A goal: 120,000 fewer smokers within 10 years

The aim of all these measures is obviously to reduce the number of smokers in the Netherlands, in particular by drastically reducing the number of points of sale for tobacco products. While there are currently 16,000 in the country, the disappearance of vending machines from 2022 will cause this number to drop to around 10,400. When supermarkets stop selling tobacco in 2024, there will be only 6,000 points of sale left, all of them specialist tobacco shops.6].

The government believes that it will then be "easier for smokers to quit, and more difficult for others to take up the habit"[7]. The Dutch Ministry of Public Health, Welfare and Sport hopes that the country will have 120,000 smokers within 10 years. Paul Blokhuis, State Secretary of the same ministry, welcomed the upcoming ban on tobacco sales in supermarkets: “With this decision and the course we have set today, we will prevent a large number of deaths and medical suffering.”[8].

According to the Dutch Trimbos Institute, which specialises in mental health and addictions, 22,% of Dutch people aged 18 and over smoked regularly in 2019, compared to 26,% in 2014[9].