The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has imposed a 10 percent processing fee on dozens of Afghan transit commercial goods imported into Afghanistan in transit via Pakistan.
The FBR has issued an SRO.816(I)/2025 to amend SRO.1380(I)/2023 for the imposition of the said processing fee on five major categories of Afghan transit commercial goods.
Earlier, a 10 percent fee was applicable on five major categories of Afghan transit commercial goods covering confectionaries/ chocolates, footwear, machinery (mechanical/ electrical), blankets/ home textiles, and garments imported into Afghanistan in transit via Pakistan.
The FBR had received proposals from the Ministry of Commerce that since Customs duty in Afghanistan is extremely low as compared to Pakistan, this facility is being misused with the connivance of businessmen from both sides.
It suggested that the FBR should take the following measures to curb the misuse of Afghan Transit Trade:
- the requirement of Revolving Insurance Guarantee for all Afghan Transit goods has to be substituted by the FBR with bank guarantee at 100 percent of the assessed value;
- processing fee at 10 percent ad valorem shall be imposed on the Afghan Transit goods showing unjustified increase in forward transit cargo Afghanistan’s Customs duties on these goods are negligible.
According to the notification issued on Saturday, the federal government has imposed processing fee at the rate of 10 percent ad valorem on the following Afghan transit Commercial goods imported into Afghanistan in transit via Pakistan:
- Pulley tackle and hoists other than skip hoists; winches and capstans;
- jacks; ships’ derricks; cranes, including cable cranes; mobile lifting frames, straddle carriers and works trucks fitted with a crane;
- Fork- lift trucks; other works trucks fitted with lifting or handling equipment; other lifting, handling, loading or unloading machinery (for example, lifts, escalators, conveyors, teleferics);
- 0ther moving, grading, levelling, scraping, excavating, tamping, compacting, extracting or boring machinery, for earth, minerals or ores; pile- drivers and pile- extractors; snow- ploughs and snow- blowers;
- agricultural, horticultural or forestry machinery for soil preparation or cultivation; lawn or sports- ground rollers; hrvesting or threshing machinery, including straw or fodder balers; grass or hay mowers; machines for cleaning, sorting or grading eggs, fruit or other agricultural produce, other than machinery of heading 84.37; milking machines and dairy machinery;
- other agricultural, horticultural, forestry, poultry- keeping or bee- keeping machinery, including germination plant fitted with mechanical or thermal equipment;
- poultry incubators and brooders; machines for cleaning, sorting or grading seed, grain or dried leguminous vegetables; machinery used in the milling industry or for the working of cereals or dried leguminous vegetables, other than farm- type machinery; machines for extruding, drawing, texturing or cutting man-made textile materials; automatic data processing machines and units thereof;
- magnetic or optical readers, machines for transcribing data onto data media in coded form and machines for processing such data, not elsewhere specified or included; transmission apparatus for radio- broadcasting or television, whether or not incorporating reception apparatus or sound recording or reproducing apparatus; television cameras, digital cameras and video camera recorders;
- electrical apparatus for switching or protecting electrical circuits, or for making connections to or in electrical circuits (for example, switches, fuses, lightning arresters, voltage limiters, surge suppressors, plugs and other connectors, junction boxes), for a voltage exceeding 1,000 volts;
- electrical parts of machinery or apparatus, not specified or included elsewhere and electrical and electronic waste and scrap.
