India-Korea CEPA: How It Lowers Your Shipping Duties
What the India-Korea Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement is and how it can reduce or remove import duties on your goods.
Key takeaways
- CEPA is the India-Korea free-trade agreement that lowers or removes duty on many goods.
- A valid Certificate of Origin is usually required to claim the benefit.
- We assess CEPA eligibility for your product and HS code.
Quick answer
The India-Korea CEPA is a free-trade agreement that reduces or eliminates customs duties on many goods traded between India and South Korea. With a valid Certificate of Origin, eligible products clear at a lower or zero duty rate — lowering your landed cost. ShipKorea.in assesses whether your shipment qualifies and guides you on claiming it.
What CEPA is
The Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement is a bilateral trade deal that progressively cuts tariffs between the two countries across thousands of product categories. It's designed to make India-Korea trade cheaper and more competitive, benefiting exporters, importers and manufacturers on both sides.
Who benefits
Exporters and importers of eligible goods can pay lower or zero duty. For businesses shipping regularly — textiles and apparel, machinery and parts, chemicals, processed food, handicrafts and more — the savings on landed cost compound quickly across shipments and directly improve margins.
Rules of origin
To qualify, goods must genuinely 'originate' in India (or Korea) under the agreement's rules of origin — meaning they're wholly produced there or sufficiently transformed there. Simply re-exporting third-country goods usually doesn't qualify. We help you assess whether your product meets these rules.
How to claim it
You generally need a Certificate of Origin issued by an authorised body, confirming the goods qualify. This document is presented at Korean customs to claim the preferential (reduced or zero) duty rate instead of the standard rate. Without it, customs applies the normal tariff.
CEPA for personal parcels
CEPA mainly benefits commercial goods with proper origin documentation. For one-off personal parcels, the practical saving usually comes via the de minimis threshold rather than CEPA, since obtaining a Certificate of Origin isn't worthwhile for a single small shipment.
What ShipKorea.in does
We check your product's HS code against the CEPA tariff schedules, advise on whether it qualifies and at what rate, and guide you through obtaining the Certificate of Origin — so you don't overpay duty on eligible shipments and stay fully compliant.
Talk to us
Share your product description, HS code (if known) and typical volumes, and we'll assess whether CEPA benefits apply, estimate the duty you could save, and set up the documentation for your regular India–Korea shipments.
