Rates in force 1 September

New rates for nearly half of import duties acting within the Customs Union take effect from 1 September; reduction concerns foodstuffs, equipment, certain types of fabrics and some types of clothing. The relevant decision was made earlier by the Eurasian Economic Commission (ECE), thus fulfilling the commitments made by Russia to the World Trade Organization (WTO), Prime writes.

Protocol on Russia's accession to the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the WTO came into force a year ago, on August 22. Changes in the Common Customs Tariff (CCT) of the Customs Union, made the following day, affected about 10% of import duties (from about 11,000). It is estimated that during the transition to a new version CCT the weighted average import duty rate decreased from 9.6% to 7,5-7,8%.

This year the commission notes that rate reduction will affect some 5,100 positions, at the same time, for each individual positions the reduction will be relatively small, usually within 1-3 percentage points, mentioned earlier in the CCT, the competence of which is now part of setting import duties.

For a number of positions combined tax rate (a combination of interest rate with lower limit in absolute terms) is replaced by ad valorem (defined as a percentage of the customs value of goods), and in some cases, ad valorem rate will be raised to the level of commitment as at the moment it is lower .

Import duties will be reduced for fish, pastries, exotic fruits, raw material for the production of the equipment, including washing machines and tractors, tropical oils, some types of fabrics and some clothes.