Customs Legislation in Turkey
Turkey has a fairly complex customs and tax legislation in place, which even challenges the most experienced customs law and tax consultants, as it changes frequently. For a foreign exporter, it would be almost impossible to keep up to date with the recent changes to the legal framework, as the state constantly introduces new legislations and duties for new products. An unseasoned exporter and/or importer can easily make a filing error and be required to pay administrative fines or additional duties for the products at the customs port.
Commercial Policy Measures & Anti-Dumping
To complicate matters even further, Turkey, as a member of WTO, also has several different commercial policy measures in place, including anti-dumping measures. The policy measures may require the exporters to pay even more additional taxes for the products they are exporting to Turkey, which can significantly impact their shipment costs.
Dumping & Anti-Dumping Measures in Turkey
As a WTO member, Turkey can issue commercial policy defense measures such as anti-dumping measures, in order to protect the local and domestic markets and producers. The goal is to prevent a foreign actor from exporting a certain good into Turkey for a very low price (i.e. lower than the local production costs) and disrupt the local markets and production. This can be done in a variety of ways, however, the most used one is imposing additional tax duties in the form of anti-dumping measures.
Anti-dumping measures and procedures are governed by several different legislations in Turkey, namely the Law on the Prevention of Unfair Competition in Imports, the Decree on the Prevention of Unfair Competition in Imports and the Regulation on the Prevention of Unfair Competition in Imports. The legislation provides an extensive set of provisions regarding the procedures and rules for dumping measures, including the application procedures and requirements for review. Once in place, a definitive dumping measure will be enforceable for a period of five year, unless an interim review investigation is launched and the measure is revoked by the Ministry.