Now that the US-Korea Free Trade Agreement has gone into effect, companies across the U.S. want to know if their goods qualify for reduced duty rates.

Under the agreement, duty reductions are assigned through “staging” categories. Commodities are split into categories A-K, with category A items being immediately free duty free and B-K items being staged to duty free over a number of years. Category B commodities will be duty free after two years; C, after three years; D, after five years and so on.

The list of tariff numbers and their respective staging categories is here[pdf].

Descriptions of the staging categories are listed here [pdf] on page 2-13, under “Annex 2-B, Tariff Elimination.”

Email your questions about the US-Korea Free Trade Agreement to Robert Stein at rstein@mohawkglobal.com or Jim Trubits atjtrubits@mohawkglobal.com.

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