FTA 원산지규정을 활용한 수출 전략

Abstract

The multilateralism and regionalism represented by WTO(World Trade Organization) and FTA(Free Trade Agreement) respectively are the two big FLAWS in today's international trading environments, and approximately 60% of world trade in the current year of 2009 appeares to be trades in regional trade agreements as they are rapidly expanding each year. Korea had been in favor of multilateralism, centering GATT(General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) and WTO as a way to achieve trade liberalization, and was slow to accept FTA; however, as the DDA(Doha Development Agenda) negotiations came to a rupture and regionalism such as NAFTA(North American Free Trade Agreement) or EU(European Union) became a new paradigm in world trade system, Korea has developed an active consideration on the FTA. In order to reduce the opportunity cost of Korean companies for the FTA expansion, the government set its basic strategy to hold simultaneous FTA negotiations with different countries in a short period of time, and built FTA networks by expanding the agreements, mostly with giant and advanced economies since 2007. However, signing the FTA itself should not be Korea's target, and that implementing the signed FTA effectively and efficiently would be of more significance. While the interest in eliminating the tariff in FTA is fairly high, the awareness of Rules of Origin, has received a passive understanding, just as a basic law to prevent free ride from the third countries, and it is the reality of the study on Rules of Origin that is specifically incomplete among other fields in FTA. The Country of Origin on imports and exports tells the country of manufacture or production, where the product comes from. Rules of Origin are the special regulations to determine the country of origin of a product and exist in the forms of international law, legislation, precedent and administrative decisions. However, it has become more difficult to determine the origin of a product as the companies today globally outsource raw materials or globalize the product manufacturing. Because the companies must meet the requirements of country of origin in the signed FTA to receive a preferential tariff, the Rules of Origin play an important role in liberalizing products through FTA and in implementing the FTA. In Country of Origin regulations of FTA, there are tangible regulations for criteria of the determination of origin to decide the country of a product, and the procedural regulation for verifying process of origin and applying the process for preferential tariff treatment. The criteria of the determination of origin can be categorized as general and supplementary, and the general criteria are involved with wholly obtained criterion and substantial transformation criterion. The criteria of substantial transformation are change in tariff classification criterion, value added criterion, and specific manufacturing criterion. And each FTA chooses and implements these three criteria, or one of the three criteria(Alternative Rule), or a combined single criterion(Combination Rule). The supplementary criteria are used to complement the drawbacks of substantial transformation criterion, to ease the inflexibility, and to maximize the economic integration effect in FTA. The supplementary criteria include de minimis rule, cumulation rule, roll-up rule, non-qualifying operation criterion, and direct transport rule. This thesis was to look into similarity and difference by comparing and analyzing the contents and characteristics of criteria of the determination of origin in five FTAs that Korea has signed. Based on such theoretical considerations, it has suggested a FTA business model that utilizes FTA network, tariff structure by items, and Rules of Origin for exporters to strengthen their competitiveness in products, and establishes and implements strategies for best preferential country of origins to provide raw materials or supply and produce intermediate goods by FTA and products. Among the models using criteria of the determination of origin, it has directly provided the models of general regulation for offshore products, of limited offshore products (Gaeseong Industrial Complex), and the model and intermediate goods regulation using the Gaeseong Industrial Complex's offshore products and cumulation rule. These models are to help Korean exporters in understanding and utilizing the Rules of Origin for their manufacturing and investing policies as the FTA expands. However, these business models are not limited to the types introduced in this thesis, and the development should be continued for concrete cases and various trading types. Although FTA is to ease trading barriers between signed countries and is a new growth opportunity for Korean import and export companies, it should not be a failure case due to the lack of adaptability in the FTA expansion.