EU countries agreed this Friday, 12th, to impose a tax of three euros from July 2026 on orders worth less than 150 euros that arrive, mainly from China, through online stores, according to European sources.
The objective is to contain the avalanche of this type of import, which has tripled since 2022, reaching 4,600 million packages below this value in 2024.
This makes it difficult for customs authorities to control content and opens the door to the entry of products that do not comply with European standards, generating unfair competition for Community manufacturers.
The Twenty-Seven agreed last month to eliminate the exemption from customs duties that orders that do not exceed 150 euros have enjoyed since 1983, but this measure will not come into force until the European Union’s (EU) unified data center is operational in 2028.
However, for the partners, this represented an excessive delay in resolving a problem they consider urgent, which is why they agreed to this temporary mechanism that will allow them to tax these packages from July 1st, until the definitive system is applied.
Specifically, the new customs tax will be imposed on all goods entering the EU from non-EU sellers registered in the single European VAT window for imports, meaning it will cover “93% of all ‘online’ trade flows to the EU”, as explained by the EU Council.
The measure, however, is different from the two-euro management fee that the European Commission also proposed applying to packages arriving in the bloc, which has not yet been approved.
The States today had two options on the table for the transitional tax: applying a rate proportional to the value of the goods or a fixed quota equal to everyone, as France had proposed.
Finally, the partners opted for the Paris proposal, which is leading initiatives to confront the Chinese online commerce giants in the EU.
“Europe is taking concrete action to protect its single market, its consumers and its sovereignty”, celebrated its French Economy Minister, Roland Lescure, who recalled that France already plans to apply at national level a management fee of two euros to these packages which, if approved by the French Parliament, could be added to the European fee agreed today.
In turn, the Spanish Economy Minister, Carlos Cuerpo, expressed before the meeting his support for the anticipation of the tax on low-value packages to “control the flow of this type of products”.
The European Commission calculates that 91% of the 12 million packages worth less than 150 euros that arrive daily in the EU come from China, and attributes this increase to the “exponential growth” of online stores such as Temu or Shein, which have won over millions of consumers in the EU thanks to “pervasive online advertising, low prices and ultra-fast shipping”.
This massive arrival of packages directly to the consumer increases the risk of counterfeit or unsafe products entering, distorts competition with European manufacturers, who must comply with community standards and pay taxes when importing in large quantities, at the same time as it harms the environment and lends itself to fraud, warn the institutions.