Ministry of Commerce extended until 2023 benefits of the Vallejo Express Plan

Entrepreneurs who take advantage of the benefit or move from the traditional Vallejo Plan to the Express will be able to advance their imports of raw materials

On March 22, through Decree 379 of March 16, 2022, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism extended until December 2023 the deadline for accessing the benefits of the Vallejo Express Plan, which in principle lasted until April of this year.

In other words, entrepreneurs who take advantage of the benefit or move from the traditional Vallejo Plan to the Express will be able to advance their imports of raw materials, within the framework of this program, until the end of next year. For capital goods and services, the term is defined according to the production project.

It should be remembered that the Vallejo Express Plan was established in October 2020 as a way to boost exports of non-mining energy goods and services and investment, as well as to give another engine to the plan for the reactivation of the economy of the Government of President Iván Duque in the face of the pandemic.

“The purpose of extending these deadlines is to continue to boost the productive activities of the business sector, the generation of employment, the facilitation of foreign trade operations with the simplification of times significantly and avoid injuries to the activities of import, marketing and sale of Colombian products both abroad and nationally,” said Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, María Ximena Lombana Villalba.

One of the key elements of support for entrepreneurs is the flexibility of export commitments for products that are made with capital goods, spare parts and raw materials imported without duty and with deferred VAT, under the Vallejo Express Plan, which directly impacts the cash flow of companies.

100 per cent of these products should no longer be exported and benefits for service companies are included.

The commitments in the three programmes are as follows:

If raw materials are imported, the export commitment is 60% of the goods produced. The remaining 40% can be marketed in the domestic market. At that time, the entrepreneur must pay the corresponding customs taxes.

If what was imported were capital goods and spare parts, there are two options for export commitments:

In the first, an export commitment of 70 per cent to 50 per cent of the goods produced is changed, resulting from the use of imported machinery and spare parts.

In the second, the export commitment is established in accordance with the import quota for machinery and spare parts, rising from 1.5 to 1.2 times the import quota.

Exporters of services will have a minimum export commitment that corresponds no longer to 1.5 times but to once the FOB value of imported goods. In addition, service exporters who increase jobs by 10% compared to what they registered in December 2019, and maintain them for the duration of the program, will have a minimum export commitment corresponding to 0.5 times the FOB value equivalent to imported goods.

On the other hand, the application for the Vallejo Express Plan can be made until March 31, 2023, so that the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism can advance the respective procedure. This evaluation and approval is no longer done in 30 days but in 15 days. The application can be made electronically through the Single Window for Foreign Trade (VUCE).

To date, 53 companies (programmes) have been accepted or transferred to the Vallejo Express Plan, of which 42 correspond to raw materials and inputs and 11 to capital goods.

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