Good news for local car importers: The Philippine Tariff Commission has just concluded its investigation into the Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) safeguards on imported motor vehicles and is recommending that the measure should not be implemented.
The DTI began imposing safeguard duties (in the form of a P70,000 cash bond on passenger cars) on imported cars earlier this year in a bid to protect the local vehicle manufacturing industry. If we’re going by the result of the Tariff Commission’s investigation, however, the move was apparently never really necessary.
In its formal findings, the commission stated that it found no increase in imported ‘completely built up’ (CBU) passengers cars and light commercial vehicles from 2014 to 2020 “both in absolute terms and relative to domestic production.”
“Since it has been established that CBU passenger cars and light commercial vehicles were not imported in increased quantities (whether absolute or relative to domestic production) during the POI [period of investigation], the Commission hereby terminates its investigation and recommends that no definitive general safeguard measure be imposed on importations of the CBU passenger cars and CBU light commercial vehicles subject of this investigation,” the investigation’s conclusion reads.
You can check out the Philippine Tariff Commission’s investigation summary in its entirety here.
No doubt the Chamber of Automotive Manufacturers of the Philippines, Inc. (CAMPI) and the Association of Vehicle Importers and Distributors (AVID) are breathing out a huge sigh of relief following this development. Do you agree with the commission’s recommendation?
