The Russian Ministries of Finance and Health are against introducing a single excise tax to alcoholic beverages and tobacco within the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU).

These administrations do not agree with the respective excise tax rates proposed by the Eurasian Economic Commission, which is the executive body of the EEU, Izvestia daily of Russia reported citing the representatives of these ministries.

The reason for this disagreement is the low rate of these excise taxes, which will be much lower than what the Ministry of Finance had proposed as a bill to the Russian State Duma.

The Russian Ministry of Health, on the other hand, considers that these excise tax rates are extremely low for “the main factor in the risk of death and disability.”

The Eurasian Economic Union member states are Armenia, Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and most recently, Kyrgyzstan