Making their mark

The UAE’s Federal Tax Authority (FTA) has said that the sale or distribution of any ‘unmarked’ tobacco products will be prohibited across all local markets as of August 1, according to a story put out by the Emirates News Agency.

In a press statement issued yesterday, the FTA said that it was holding a series of training workshops to introduce inspectors across the UAE’s economic development departments to the objectives and implementation methods of the Marking Tobacco and Tobacco Products Scheme, which went into effect in January.

The FTA’s director-general, Khalid Ali Al Bustani, was quoted as saying the digital marks would be placed on tobacco packaging and registered in the FTA’s database. The marks contained data that could be read using a sophisticated device, he said.

The digital coding scheme is aimed at preventing the sale of non-tax-compliant tobacco products.

The workshops were said to be part of the Authority’s commitment to maintaining communication with all relevant government and private-sector entities.

They were aimed at keeping these entities informed about developments surrounding tax procedures, while, at the same time, taking account of their opinions and suggestions to ensure the UAE tax system was implemented easily and seamlessly.