Baku, Azerbaijan, July 3
By Fakhri Vakilov – Trend:
The Ministry of Investment and Foreign Trade of Uzbekistan has published a list of goods for which it is planned to increase import customs duties, Trend reports with reference to the ministry.
"A thorough analysis of foreign trade processes in Uzbekistan showed that at current rates of customs duties, negative effects are possible for the development of the real sector of the economy: In this situation, importing goods becomes profitable, and industries can lose their investment attractiveness and reorient themselves to import finished products," read the message.
The ministry states that the establishment of new customs tariff rates will create favorable conditions for the development of high-value-added products, optimize imports and create prerequisites for concluding mutually beneficial bilateral free trade agreements.
The changes are as follows:
- Commodities; goods not produced in Uzbekistan; socially significant goods; goods that have not been imported in the past 3 years got the rate of 2 percent-5 percent;
- semi-finished or finished products, the production of which is inefficient from the standpoint of natural and climatic conditions or economically impractical; ready-made and processed foods produced in the country, but not meeting current demand; goods whose production is increasing; food products that have a relative negative impact on human health got the rate of 10 percent-15 percent;
- agricultural products cultivated in sufficient quantities and exported; finished products of final consumption, produced in Uzbekistan in volumes covering demand; luxury and non-essential goods that have a negative impact on human health (tobacco and alcohol) got the rate of 20 percent-30 percent.
Moreover, it is planned to reduce customs duty rates for 197 commodity items that are not produced in the country: for 89 commodity items - from 5 percent to 2 percent, for 79 items - from 10 percent to 5 percent, and for 7 positions - from 20 percent to 2 percent.
Furthermore, based on the market conditions, the amount of duties for 2,818 items of goods will remain unchanged.
When establishing the proposed size of customs duties, the average rate will be about 9 percent, which will exceed the current value of 5.6 percent, but will be significantly lower than the level of 2017 (14.9 percent).
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