What the New Tariff Policy Means for Turkiye’s Shrinking Economic Freedom

On 6th of January, a new tariff policy that abolished the exemption rule for goods under €30 went to regulation in Turkiye. Under the new procedure that upset many Turkish consumers, all overseas commerce must include the standart custom validation which subsumes value added tax (VAT).

While the government framed the reform as a necessary step to protect domestic producers and improve consumer safety, critics state that the decision places a disproportionate restriction on individuals while favoring established large domestic e-commerce platforms.

The rule takes effect in 30 days and limits duty-free status only to humanitarian items which are medicines up to €1,500. From the time of effect, a €10 purchase from abroad will requirea a full declaration and will be taxed at 30% for EU-origin or 60% for non‑EU plus any special levies such as 20% on certain goods.For most, this means that a system “widely used by Turkish consumers to order low-cost items” has been shut down, aligning Turkiye with global shifts as the EU itself is phasing out a €150 exemption.

Government officials and business representatives offered varying responses to the public backlash. Istanbul Chamber of Commerce (İTO) Chairman Şekib Avdagiç described the regulation as “an opportunity for Türkiye to strengthen its production employment and trade balance in the ong term.” He continued his statement with underlining that commerce needs the government support so that Turkiye can become “a global brand in e-exports.”

However, critics point to the outcomes of the previous exemption reduction as evidence that such expectations may be misplaced. As the maximum exemption price was lowered from €150 to €30 in 2024, hopes of supporting domestic industry were the same.

Yet, when focusing on one of the key industries that is affected from tariff changes, ready-to-wear sector suggest the opposite: while industry imports increased by 18 percent, domestic production failed to rise, capacity utilization fell to 68 percent, which led to approximately 56,000 workers lost their jobs. One industry representative summarized the situation as, “The same products still enter the country, only now through intermediaries, at their prices.”

Another justification put forward by the Ministry of Trade was that consumer safety risks were associated with simplified customs procedures. According to inspections conducted in October 2025, “81 percent of products entering Turkiye under the previous policy were found to be risky towards legislations.” Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu, President of the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Türkiye (TOBB), called the abolition of the exemption “entirely appropriate,” claiming that “uncontrolled individual imports create serious risks for consumers and create unfair competition for small and medium-sized enterprises.”

However, critics argue that stricter inspection mechanisms could have been implemented without eliminating the exemption altogether which fronts market regulations to restrictions against consumer access.

The firms expected to benefit most from the new regime are major domestic e-commerce platforms such as Hepsiburada and Trendyol, which possess the legal infrastructure required to navigate full customs compliance. This dynamic has intensified backlash over regulatory change, because of the reason that both platforms have previously been criticized for their proximity to political power and were included in boycott lists during last year’s nationwide protests.

At the same time, this policy shift follows a global change of perspective towards global e-commerce. As Turkiye established its first low-value exemption allowance decades agoi mirroring EU’s 22 Euro rule at the time, the limit was raised to €150 over time to boost trade freedom. Under the rules that cut down this value to €30 in 2024, consumers could still import non-commercial items with the condition of paying 30% on EU goods.

This recent move of change phase out this allowance by exemplifying countries like US who abolished its “high de minimis” in mid 2023. However, analysts noted that US simply dropped ceiling to align with the fluctuating foreign policy to hit Chinese companies like Temu and Shein. Another example given for the global trend toward restrictions is the EU adoption of per-package custom fees, which is still far from outright bans to exemption.

As a conclusion, critics argue that regulatory tweaks like US and EU could have addressed fair competition goals without stripping citizens from affordable imports and economical freedom rights.

From a fiscal perspective, the reform can be examined through with the Laffer Curve, which suggests that beyond a certain threshold, higher taxes reduce total revenue by discouraging economic participation. Under the previous system, millions of consumers paid simplified taxes on low-value imports, generating broad-based income for the country from a small window.

Under the new rules, however, even a €10 item requires full customs declarations and layered taxation, pushing many consumers to abandon overseas purchases altogether. As a consumer reaction circulating in the social media platform X put it, “I used to pay tax on every order, now I don’t order at all.”

In this context, taxation ceases to function as a revenue-generating tool and instead becomes a deterrent, selectively excluding individual citizens from markets while pushing demand in the hands of well-connected importers. For critics, this explains why the abolition of the €30 exemption is widely perceived not as neutral regulation, but as an economic constraint on everyday freedom.