Customs and Excise (Printing and Packaging) (Suspension) Regulations, 2026

The Minister of Finance has made regulations suspending customs duty on listed materials imported or taken out of bond by registered manufacturers for making printing and packaging products. They take effect from 1 January 2026.

To register, a manufacturer applies before importing, must be registered with ZIMRA with a valid tax clearance, passes an inspection of premises and machinery, builds secure stores that can take Customs locks, enters into a bond with surety, and pays the registration fee set under the Customs and Excise (General) Regulations — half if approved after 30 June — renewable by 31 January each year. The Third Schedule lists 44 approved manufacturers, among them Zimpapers (Herald and Chronicle), Hunyani Paper and Packaging, Printflow, Natprint, Natpak, Fidelity Printers and Refiners, Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe, Zimind Publishers, Mambo Press, Carnaud Metal Box and Treger Plastics.

Materials must be entered at the port nearest the factory with a declaration that they are for printing and packaging only. A stock-book must be kept; without one, materials are presumed misused. Disposal needs the Commissioner's permission and payment of duty, and cancelled registration makes suspended duty immediately payable.

Each manufacturer must give the Minister an annual report within 30 days after each year from 1 January, covering jobs, capacity use, new investment, output growth, research and development, export documents (CD1 forms), social responsibility and environmental protection. Without it the suspension is withdrawn and duty and penalties are due.

Eligible materials include printing inks, pigments, adhesives, solvents and primers; photographic plates and film; polyethylene, polypropylene, PET and PVC films, sheets and cores; newsprint, printing paper and paperboard, kraftliner, sack kraft, fluting and testliner, greaseproof and self-copy paper, coated papers and self-adhesive reels; polypropylene yarn, bolting cloth, backed aluminium foil, and printing plates and cylinders.