UK leather importers to benefit from zero duty

The elimination of duty on some leather imports should help UK-based footwear and leathergoods producers.

The government of the United Kingdom has outlined a new ‘global tariff’ to be introduced on January 1st 2021. This will replace the European Union’s common external tariff schedule and follows the UK’s formal departure from the EU on January 31st of this year.

In line with this planned legislation, the Leather UK industry body reportedly lobbied politicians on behalf of leather producers and footwear and finished leathergoods manufacturers in an attempt to remove all import tariffs affecting leather. The new global tariff list eliminates importation duty on a range of leather imports which, according to some industry commentators, will be good news for UK-based footwear and leathergoods manufacturers.

The duty that will be imposed on bovine crust imported into the UK is to drop from 6.5 per cent to a zero rate. Similarly, finished bovine leather (previously taxed at 6.5 per cent), equine wet blue and crust – which had faced a 5.5 per cent tariff – and finished sheep leather (formerly 3.5 per cent) will all have their charges dropped to zero.

Publishing Data

This article was originally published on page 4 of the July/August 2020 issue of SATRA Bulletin.

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