Amsterdam Keeps Coffeeshops Open to Tourists While Raising Europe’s Highest Tourist Tax

The years-long attempt to keep foreign tourists out of Amsterdam’s coffeeshops died in coalition negotiations. The new agreement keeps the doors open and sets the tourist tax at the highest in Europe.

For years it seemed Amsterdam was finally going to close its doors to smoking tourists

This week, that plan died. A ban on foreign visitors buying cannabis was not included in the new coalition agreement the city’s ruling parties presented on June 3rd, meaning the cannabis tourism mecca remains open to all.

The agreement, sealed between PRO Amsterdam, the merger of PvdA and GroenLinks, and D66, and titled “Jouw stad is mijn stad. Ons Amsterdam” (“Your city is my city. Our Amsterdam”), eliminated the so-called ingezetenencriterium, the residency criterion that would have only allowed residents to purchase cannabis in the city’s approximately 166 coffeeshops. The long-debated project for an erotic center near the RAI (Amsterdam International Airport) fell victim to the same measure.

Talk of a ban had been circulating in Amsterdam since at least 2021, championed for years by Mayor Femke Halsema, who could impose it by decree but always said she wanted the council’s approval. Last year, the PvdA included it in their platform. The catch: GroenLinks and D66 never supported it, and when the PvdA merged with GroenLinks to form PRO, the plan ultimately died within the very party that had championed it.

The argument that prevailed is the one coffeeshop owners in Amsterdam have been making for years: banning tourists doesn’t eliminate demand; it simply hands it over to street dealers. Criminologist Dirk Korf, who has studied the issue for years, found that nearly a quarter of foreign tourists would turn to the black market if locals closed their doors to them, exchanging a regulated product for whatever anyone can sell on a bridge.

The industry celebrated. Arjan Roskam, of the Green House chain, and Joachim Helms, of the BCD coffeeshop association, who spent months lobbying against the measure, interpreted the outcome as a victory for street safety as much as for their business.

What’s interesting is the timing. Cannabis tourism is cooling down almost everywhere. Germany’s partial legalization in 2024 meant Germans no longer needed to cross a border for a legal joint, Thailand’s boom is faltering, and Europe’s newer markets are maintaining their strict regulations. Amsterdam, the original, decided to keep its doors open while much of the world is backing away.

That doesn’t mean that Amsterdam is rolling out the red carpet. The same agreement raises the tourist tax from 12.5% ​​of the nightly rate to 16% next year, climbing to nearly 20%, comfortably the highest in Europe. Amsterdam isn’t going to stop tourists from visiting its coffeeshops. It’s just going to charge them more for the bed they sleep in afterward.

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(Featured image by Tamara Malaniy via Unsplash)

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First published in elplanteo. A third-party contributor translated and adapted the article from the original. In case of discrepancy, the original will prevail.

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