Circular No. 167/2014/TT-BTC issuing special preferential tariff of Vietnam to implement AKFTA 06/01/2015 01:59:00 1404

The Ministry of Finance issued Circular No. 167/2014/TT-BTC dated 14 November 2014 prescribing AKFTA special preferential tariff period 2015-18. Circular No. 167/2014/TT-BTC came to force on 01 January 2015 to 31/12/2018, replacing Circular No. 163/2011/TT-BTC dated 17 November 2011 which expired on 31 December 2014.

Period 2015-18 is an important time when the import duty rates in the AKFTA are committed to cut deep with approximately 86% of tariff lines, in order to reach the final commitment to eliminate import duties in 2018.

AKFTA Tariff covers all items that Vietnam committed to cut tax under AKFTA based on the 2012 list of goods of Vietnam, including 9,503 tax lines with 9,471 8-digit lines and 32 10-digit lines. The average rate of AKFTA tariff for 2012-2014 is 6.07% and will be reduced to 1.92% in 2015-2018. The reduction of average rate is due to all items in normal list to be eliminated in 2015, a number of lines is extended to 2016 and 2018 (340 lines to zero in 2016 and 478 lines to zero in 2018). This flexible group includes agricultural groups (seafood, chicken, candy, milk and milk products, oil and grease, vegetable ...), the industry (textiles, chemicals, machinery, plastics, paper, basic metal products, building materials ...).

Sensitive items in AKFTA are obliged to reduce in 2015-2018, namely with 20% tax rate in 2017 and 2018 (over 600 tax lines at 8-digit and 10-digit levels). These are items such as petroleum products, construction materials, paper, steel, components, automobile parts ... In addition, a number of sensitive products such as automobiles, a number of steel products, tobacco… are not obliged to cut tax under AKFTA in 2015-18.