Customs Duty Korean Used Car Mozambique: 2026 Rates

Customs duty on a Korean used car in Mozambique runs 5% to 25% of the CIF value, scaled by both vehicle class and engine displacement rather than a single flat rate. Layered on top, the Autoridade Tributária (AT) charges a separate ICE excise of 0-35% based on engine displacement, a 17% IVA (VAT), and an age-based environmental surcharge (0% up to 5 years, 15% for 6-10 years, 35% over 10 years). There is no hard age ban — Mozambique taxes age instead — and total landed cost typically runs 42% to 180% above the original FOB Busan price depending on which side of those three scales a given vehicle falls.

If you haven't picked a model yet, our Mozambique buyer's guide ranks the best Hyundai and Kia options for Maputo, Beira and Nampula by budget band, and our Mozambique import guide covers the full BIVAC inspection, port routing and INATTER registration process end to end. This guide focuses purely on the customs duty korean used car mozambique question: exactly what you owe, how the three duty scales compound, and how to budget accurately before you wire a deposit.

Mozambique Customs Duty Rates at a Glance

Unlike the East African Community's single flat 25% import duty, Mozambique's AT applies customs duty korean used car mozambique buyers owe on a sliding scale that blends vehicle class and engine size: roughly 5% for one-tonne commercial trucks, around 10% for vans and minibuses, and 10-25% for ordinary passenger cars depending on displacement. That duty is then stacked with a completely separate ICE excise and a separate age-based surcharge — three independent levers instead of one, which is what makes Mozambique's math more granular than almost any other market in this series.

How the AT Calculates the Duty Stack

Working out the customs duty korean used car mozambique buyers actually owe starts with the CIF value — Cost, Insurance and Freight: the FOB price plus ocean freight to Maputo, Beira or Nacala plus marine cargo insurance. The Autoridade Tributária de Moçambique (AT) does not simply accept your invoice at face value: it cross-references the declared CIF against its own reference values filed through ASYCUDA, a caution mechanism similar to the valuation guides used across East Africa and covered in our customs valuation guide. Under-declaring a Korean invoice to shrink the duty bill is a shortcut AT's reference-value system is specifically built to catch.

Once the CIF value is set, the calculation runs in four stacked steps:

1. Step 1 — Customs duty: CIF value × 5-25%, set by vehicle class and engine displacement
2. Step 2 — ICE excise: CIF value × 0-35%, set purely by engine displacement band
3. Step 3 — Environmental surcharge: CIF value × 0%, 15% or 35%, set by vehicle age
4. Step 4 — IVA: (CIF value + duty + ICE + surcharge) × 17%

On top of that four-step tax stack, buyers also pay a set of flat fees that don't scale with CIF value: a BIVAC or Intertek pre-shipment inspection of $280-450 paid in Korea, a despachante (customs broker) fee of roughly MZN 12,000, INATTER vehicle registration of MZN 8,500-12,000, and compulsory third-party insurance (Seguro Obrigatorio) of MZN 4,200-8,400 per year. According to KITA (Korea International Trade Association), Korean used-vehicle exports to Southern Africa have grown as buyers move away from aging Japanese RHD stock routed through Durban, and getting this four-step tax math right — before adding the flat fees on top — is the single most common budgeting mistake first-time Mozambique buyers make.

The Engine-Displacement ICE Excise

The ICE (Imposto sobre Consumos Específicos) excise is Mozambique's second independent lever in the customs duty korean used car mozambique stack, charged purely on engine displacement regardless of the vehicle's class or age:

Because the ICE excise runs independently of the customs duty table, two vehicles in the same duty class can land at very different totals purely on engine size. A Hyundai Accent 1.4 and a Hyundai Tucson 2.0 can both fall into a similar passenger-car duty band, yet the Tucson's 1,998cc engine pulls a 10% ICE excise that the Accent's sub-1,500cc engine avoids entirely — before either vehicle's age is even considered.

The Age-Based Environmental Surcharge (No Hard Age Ban)

The third lever, and the one most first-time buyers underestimate, is the age-based environmental surcharge — charged on CIF value in three bands:

Unlike Uganda's hard 15-year import ban or Kenya's 8-year cutoff, Mozambique places no outright age limit on used-car imports — it taxes age instead of banning it, an approach closer to Tanzania's than to its EAC neighbors. That makes the economic sweet spot for 2026 imports the 2020-2024 model years: recent enough to avoid any surcharge, while still meeting the Euro IV emissions minimum that AT expects.

Total Landed Cost Calculator — 4 Worked Examples

Here is how the full duty-plus-ICE-plus-surcharge-plus-IVA stack plays out across four real-world cases, using an indicative MZN 64 = $1 USD rate and a duty sub-schedule of 5% for commercial trucks, 10% for passenger cars under 1,500cc, 20% for 1,501-2,500cc, and 25% above 2,500cc — confirm exact bands with AT, since passenger-car duty is scaled by both class and displacement rather than published as a single rate table:

The Accent lands within the published 42-58% sweet-spot range because it clears all three scales at or near their lowest point. The Sportage, seven years old and carrying a 1,998cc engine, already crosses the 6-10-year surcharge band and pays the mid-tier ICE rate, nearly doubling its FOB price once landed. Now compare the two extremes — an aging large-engine diesel against a young commercial truck:

The Santa Fe diesel example is the one to study closely: at 13 years old and 2,199cc, it crosses the over-10-year surcharge band (+35% of CIF) and lands in the 2,001-3,000cc ICE band, which then steps up further under the age-related ICE penalty — so it pays something close to the maximum on two of the three independent scales at once. Despite carrying the lowest FOB price of all four vehicles compared, its 180% markup is the highest in the group. The Porter H100 commercial truck, by contrast, benefits from its 5% commercial-class duty even though its 2,497cc diesel engine still pulls a 25% ICE excise — its 0-5-year age keeps the surcharge at zero, landing it well below the passenger-car Sportage despite a larger engine. That's the practical lesson of Mozambique's three-lever system: no single factor decides your landed cost, and the worst outcomes happen when class, displacement and age all work against you simultaneously.

Live stock: explore Hyundai inventory or browse Kia vehicles — every FOB quote can be converted into a full Mozambique landed-cost estimate on request.

Mozambique vs South Africa vs Eswatini

Mozambique shares the SADC bloc with South Africa and Eswatini, but its duty architecture is structurally different from both:

The key distinction: Mozambique is the only one of the three where duty itself scales with vehicle class and engine displacement, while South Africa's import guide and Eswatini's import guide both describe a largely flat ad valorem rate. South Africa adds a further complication most buyers overlook: ordinary used-car imports are mostly restricted to returning residents and immigrants under an ITAC import permit, a barrier Mozambique and Eswatini don't impose. That makes Mozambique's three-lever system more granular and, for young or small-engine vehicles, often cheaper — but structurally harsher than either neighbor once a vehicle is old and large-engined, since Mozambique is the only one of the three stacking an explicit age-based surcharge on top of its other charges.

Step-by-Step Customs Clearance Process

Step 3 is the step most other markets in this series don't require in the same way: Mozambique's BIVAC or Intertek pre-shipment inspection must be completed in Korea before the bill of lading is issued, not after arrival. Our pre-shipment inspection guide covers how that process works generally, and SH GLOBAL coordinates PSI scheduling at the Busan port ahead of departure so step 4's ASYCUDA filing isn't held up waiting on a late inspection certificate.

Documents Required for Mozambique Customs Clearance

A mismatch between your declared CIF value and AT's reference-value assessment, a missing BIVAC certificate, or a wrong steering configuration are the most common causes of delay — far more common than any dispute over the duty rate itself. Mozambique's Decreto 30/2018 requires factory right-hand drive; INATTER refuses to register left-hand-drive conversions, so confirming RHD spec before the car ships matters as much as the paperwork. Our LHD vs RHD guide explains how to verify steering configuration on a specific VIN.

• Commercial invoice / proforma invoice showing the agreed FOB price
• Bill of lading confirming shipment to Maputo, Beira or Nacala
• Korean de-registration certificate confirming the vehicle is cleared for export
• BIVAC / Intertek PSI certificate, issued in Korea before B/L
• ASYCUDA customs declaration with the calculated CIF value
• Insurance certificate for the shipment, plus local Seguro Obrigatorio after arrival

Our customs valuation guide covers how these documents feed into the final cost calculation across markets generally, while this guide applies that framework specifically to Mozambique's class-, displacement- and age-scaled duty stack.

5 Legal Ways to Reduce Your Mozambique Import Costs

1. Buy 2020-2024 model years — the environmental surcharge is the single biggest swing factor on an older car, and it drops to zero entirely inside the 0-5-year band.
2. Choose the smallest displacement that does the job — dropping from 2,001cc to 1,999cc, for example, moves a car from the 25% ICE band to the 10% band.
3. Consider commercial-class vehicles where the use case allows it — the Hyundai Porter and Kia Bongo benefit from a roughly 5% duty class versus 10-25% for passenger cars.
4. Lock your CIF value accurately from the start — under-declaring invites an AT revaluation through ASYCUDA that costs more than the duty saved; our customs valuation guide explains how reference pricing works.
5. Use an exporter who pre-screens RHD spec and BIVAC PSI before shipping — SH GLOBAL Co., Ltd. checks Mozambique-bound inventory against Decreto 30/2018's RHD requirement before it ever leaves Korea, avoiding a rejected registration at INATTER.

Whatever model, displacement or age band you choose, the customs duty korean used car mozambique math above stays the same shape: CIF value first, then customs duty, then the ICE excise, then the environmental surcharge, then IVA, then the flat PSI, despachante, INATTER and insurance fees. SH GLOBAL Co., Ltd. sources directly from Korean auctions and fleet channels with no middlemen, which keeps the FOB side of your Mozambique landed-cost equation as low as possible before duty, excise and IVA are even applied. If you're exploring other Southern or wider African markets alongside Mozambique, our Africa export guide covers the region's shipping routes and requirements in full.

Because duty, ICE excise, the environmental surcharge and IVA are all calculated off one starting number — the CIF value — and because three independent scales (class, displacement, age) all feed into that total rather than just one, getting the CIF figure right and knowing exactly where your VIN sits on each scale is worth more than chasing savings anywhere else in the process. SH GLOBAL's team works with buyers in English and Portuguese to confirm the exact landed-cost figure for a specific VIN before any deposit changes hands, rather than letting a buyer discover the real total only after the car has already shipped.