MEF formalizes the continuity of the drawback for exporters and cancels its reduction

The Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) today published a decree that maintains the restitution of tariff tax exportersthe so -called drawback that, in this way, will no longer be eliminated.

Drawback is a customs mechanism that returns to exporters part of the tariffs paid by the importation of raw materials used in local production.

Initially, this benefit was going to be reduced from 3% to 0.5% as of July 31, 2025. However, the head of the MEF, José Salardi, He promised the business unions, at a meeting, his approval to repeal this measure.

In his opinion, they consider that there is an international scenario of uncertainty and extraordinary changes in foreign trade, which “require measures that allow maintaining the competitiveness of local exports.”

The modification published in the Official Gazette El Peruano leaves two previous rules that established the gradual decrease of the customs mechanism.

Supreme Decree No. 189-2024-EF, now repealed, modified the drawback regulations and established a rate of 1% by the end of 2024, then reducing to 0.5%. Although, subsequently, Supreme Decree No. 197-2024-EF ordered that the reduction of the drawback starts on July 31, 2025, while since 2026, it would be totally eliminated.

From the MEF they argue that this uncertainty arose in the international economic-commercial landscape, where different countries have adopted or threatened to adopt protectionist measures, such as the increase in tariffs and the imposition of paraarancelar barriers.

The legal norm states that before a scenario of uncertainty and extraordinary changes in the international context, and within the framework of customs policy and tariff political, it is considered appropriate to leave the modifications to the current model of the simplified restitution procedure of tariff rights.

The head of the MEF said that it should be taken into account that Peruvian exporters “do not have an optimal competitiveness yet, that is, as a state we have not yet generated the conditions to have the best competitiveness.”