Part 3 · The Excise desk · Chapter 7

Cola, cigarettes and sugar: Excise Tax fundamentals & registration

What's taxed, at what rate, and who must register

Fatima moves you to the Excise desk for two weeks. "Different world," she says. "No threshold. If you import, produce or stockpile excise goods, you register first. And the drinks rules changed on 1 January 2026, so half the internet is out of date."

Waiting for you: Gulf Vapor, an e-liquid maker in a Designated Zone in Ras Al Khaimah, and Union Beverages, a Dubai soft-drink producer.

Your mission

• Know which goods are excise goods and at what rate.
• Explain the 2026 sugar-content model for sweetened drinks.
• Register Gulf Vapor FZE and Union Beverages for Excise Tax.

Rules settled in this chapter

• "Isn't it 50% on soft drinks?": Since 2026, sweetened drinks are taxed per litre: AED 1.09 for 8 g or more sugar per 100 ml, AED 0.79 for 5 g to under 8 g, AED 0 below 5 g or when artificially sweetened. Energy drinks stay at 100%.
• No certificate, no discount: A sweetened drink without a sugar conformity certificate is taxed at the high-sugar rate. Get the certificate before the first production run.

What Excise Tax targets

• Goods, not general commerce
• What the rate actually applies to

Registration, stockpilers, and Designated Zones

• No threshold, activity-triggered
• Stockpilers
• Designated Zones

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