Trade Barriers

According to the latest Trade (MFN) Tariff Trade Restrictiveness Index (TTRI), Lebanon ranked 59th out of 125 countries, making it more open than that of an average Middle East and North Africa (MENA) or lower‐middle‐income country.⁽¹⁾

A substantial percentage of customs' tariff lines have duties equal to 0 or 5%. The government does not impose tariffs on exports, and import tariffs were reduced by 80% in 2008.⁽²⁾ The General outline of Lebanese tariff is as follows:

• Total simple average is 6%
• Simple Average on agriculture products is 15.7%.
• Simple Average on industrial products is 4.4%

In general, European goods are exempted from customs fees in accordance with the European Mediterranean Association Agreement and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) agreement effective March 1, 2015, with minor exceptions. In addition, goods from several Arab countries are also exempted from customs fees in accordance with the Greater Arab Free Trade Area (GAFTA) Agreement.

The full Lebanese customs tariff could be viewed from: http://www.customs.gov.lb/Tariff/Tariff.aspx which provides a searchable database that displays import duties by tariff number.

The following table shows the average applied MFN tariff on basic sectors

^{(1) Official portal of Investment Authority in Lebanon(IDAL)}

^{(2) Official portal of Investment Authority in Lebanon(IDAL)}

^{(3) MFN applied tariffs are the tariffs imposed on imports from all countries on equal basis. As an exemption of this rule are the countries that have preferential arrangements with the importer country.}