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Decreto 0264 of 16 March 2026 raises the NMF (Most-Favoured Nation) import duty to 35% on 14 steel and metal-mechanical subpartidas in the HS 72-73 cluster — specifically: rolled bars and rods, angles, shapes and sections, hollow profiles, seamless tubes, welded tubes, wire rod, drawn wire, barbed wire, and manufactured wire products. The measure explicitly targets non-FTA origin (China, Russia, Turkey, India) to reduce the diversion of global steel overcapacity into the Colombian market.
The legal vehicle is a partial amendment to Decreto 1881 de 2021 (which had established a prior MFN tariff structure for these subpartidas). The one-year sunset clause with mandatory impact review by the Comité de Asuntos Aduaneros distinguishes this from a permanent structural reform — it is framed as a time-limited industrial-policy intervention with an evidence review gate.
The measure operationalises a specific pillar of CONPES 4129 (Política Nacional de Reindustrialización): reducing Colombia's productive-matrix dependence on hydrocarbon extraction by creating competitive domestic capacity in construction-critical manufacturing sectors.
The steel and metal-mechanical sector accounts for ~10% of Colombian industrial GDP and approximately 45,000 direct and indirect jobs. It supplies the construction, infrastructure (roads, bridges, energy), and capital-goods sectors — all of which are central to the Petro administration's infrastructure-investment agenda. Over 25,000 domestic suppliers depend on the sector for intermediate inputs.
Steel imports from non-FTA origins — primarily Chinese overcapacity exports — had depressed domestic producer margins through 2024-25 as global steel prices fell. The 35% tariff restores price competitiveness for Colombian steelmakers (Acerías Paz del Río / Votorantim Siderurgia, Ternium Colombia, Diaco) against non-FTA import competition.
This measure fits a broader 2026 LatAm trade-defence cycle triggered by the post-2024 US tariff escalation and the resulting global steel trade-flow diversion pressure:
Mexico raised duties on 185 tariff fractions to 5–35%, covering steel, aluminium, chemicals, textiles, and capital goods — directly peer to this Colombian measure in timing, structure, and target-origin logic.
diverting Chinese/Russian/Turkish steel into Latin American markets; Colombia and Mexico are building a counter-wall around domestic steel producers.
inputs sourced from non-FTA origins; cost pass-through depends on market structure (domestic producers with pricing power vs. importers absorbing margin compression).
early April 2027 — watch for extension or escalation if diversion continues.
domestic beneficiaries; downstream consumers (construction, auto-parts, capital goods) bear the cost-pass-through risk.
planning documents into active tariff-instrument deployment — the first major trade-defence step in the Petro industrial-policy sequence.
measure to lapse after the one-year review (March 2027).
(GATT Article I MFN principle) given its explicit origin-differentiated design.
may benefit from competitive displacement of non-FTA origin imports.