UK and South Korea signal new commerce deal aimed toward vehicles, salmon and Guinness

[ad_1] The UK has signed a brand new commerce cope with South Korea designed to extend exports of vehicles, Scottish salmon and Guinness canned in Britain.

Keir Starmer described the deal, which replaces an present settlement, as “an enormous win for British enterprise and dealing individuals”. It follows UK offers with India and the US, and the free commerce settlement with the EU clinched this yr.

Present commerce between the UK and South Korea is price greater than £15bn a yr beneath a 2019 post-Brexit association. The brand new deal covers the exports of companies, automotive, pharmaceutical and foods and drinks, and would convey an additional £400m a yr to the British economic system, the UK authorities mentioned.

Considerably, the deal additionally lowers the edge on the amount of components in a automotive that have to be British or from the EU to qualify for zero tariffs from January.

Below the present guidelines, 55% of a automotive have to be made within the UK or the EU to qualify for duty-free gross sales. This has been dropped to 25% beneath the brand new deal, enabling carmakers to purchase batteries or battery elements from China and nonetheless qualify for zero-tariff exports to South Korea.

The commerce minister Chris Bryant tries a racing simulation at Samsung in London to mark the tip of negotiations on the UK-South Korea deal. {Photograph}: Lisa O’Carroll/The Guardian Richard Molyneux, the chief finance officer at Jaguar Land Rover, welcomed the deal, whereas Frank-Steffen Walliser, the chief government of Bentley Motors, described continued entry to a key marketplace for the posh model as “nice information”.

Nik Jhangiani, the interim chief government of Diageo, mentioned the brand new commerce association would “assist export progress for Guinness”, which though made in Dublin, is canned in Runcorn and Belfast.

Introduced by the UK commerce minister, Chris Bryant, and his South Korean counterpart, Yeo Han-koo, on the Samsung superstore in King’s Cross, London, the deal additionally provides British firms the chance to tender for public procurement contracts in Seoul, to supply authorized companies and the possibility to do enterprise by way of e-contracts for the primary time.

“In the present day’s settlement secures the UK as a world chief in digital commerce and innovation whereas boosting our world-class companies sector, supporting iconic manufacturers, and giving cast-iron protections to our key industries to hurry up financial progress as a part of our plan for change,” Bryant mentioned.

Yeo mentioned the deal would “strengthen the free-market system” at a time of “heightened uncertainty” and allowed allies to proceed working within the rule-based buying and selling atmosphere that Donald Trump disrupted together with his US tariff push this yr.