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Jan Guo Men Wai
Beijing 100600
P. R. China
Tel: 0086-10-65325258
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Customs Tariff Nomenclature

Ethiopia is a member of the World Customs Organization and has acceded to the International Convention on Harmonized Description and Coding System. According to the Harmonized System(HS) tariff structure, most of the goods imported previously duty free and those with specific duty rates were replaced by ad valorem rate. In the tariff structure, whether durable or not, goods are given a tariff code & classified on the basis of their type & characteristics in to 21 sections & 99 chapters.

Customs Duty

The Government of Ethiopia, since 1992, has taken successive measures to drastically & progressively reduce rates of customs duty to open the local market to foreign competition. This measure has the following features:
- maximum import tariff has been reduced from 230% to 50 %,
- weighted average rate has been reduced from 41.6% to 21.5%,
- 65% of importable items are within the range of 5% to 20% duty,
- tariff bands have been reduced to seven (excluding zero-duty rate),
- there are no discriminatory duty exemptions,
- all export taxes have been abolished.

A further reduction in the maximum tariff rate to 40% and the weighted rate to 19.5% is also being considered.

There are also no restrictions in the import of any goods except for those items which are socially and morally harmful (eg. drugs, armaments, indecent prints, counterfeit money etc.). There is neither import ban nor quantitative import restriction.

Import Payment

Commercial banks which are licensed in Ethiopia are authorized to facilitate imports and provide associated services against submission of the required documents by the importer. The payment methods can be one of the following: Letter of Credit(L/C), Cash Against Document(CAD), Advance Payment, Suppliers Credit, External Loans, and/or Franco Valuta.