Mercosul origin criteria — CMC Decision 05/23 (effective July 2024)
Brazil's preferential rules of origin for intra-Mercosul trade are governed by Common Market Council (Conselho do Mercado Comum — CMC) Decision 05/23, which entered into force on 18 July 2024 and replaced the prior CMC Decision 01/09 regime that had been in place since 2009. CMC Decision 05/23 was incorporated into Brazilian law by Decreto 12.058 of 13 June 2024, which promulgated the 218th Additional Protocol to the Economic Complementation Agreement No. 18 (ACE 18) among Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay.
Goods qualifying as originating under CMC Decision 05/23 enjoy zero-tariff treatment when traded among the four Mercosul member states, provided the importer presents valid proof of origin (either a certificate of origin issued by an authorised certifying entity or, under the new regime, a self-declaration of origin by the exporter — the "dual-system" model aligned with EU and EFTA best practices).
## Wholly-obtained criterion
Goods are wholly obtained in a single Mercosul state if they fall within one of the enumerated categories in CMC Decision 05/23, including: mineral products extracted from the soil or seabed of that state; vegetable products harvested there; live animals born and raised there; products derived from live animals raised there; products of hunting, trapping, fishing, or aquaculture conducted there; products of sea fishing and other products taken from the sea by vessels registered in that state; waste and scrap resulting from manufacturing operations conducted there; and goods produced there exclusively from the foregoing. A good that is wholly obtained in one Mercosul state is deemed 100% originating for the purpose of tariff preferences.
## Substantial-transformation test — tariff-shift and maximum non-originating materials (MaxMNO)
When a good incorporates materials from non-Mercosul countries (third-country inputs), it qualifies as originating if it satisfies the product-specific rules of origin (requisitos específicos de origem — REOs) listed in Appendix II to CMC Decision 05/23. Each NCM tariff line (Nomenclatura Comum do Mercosul, Brazil's national implementation of the Harmonized System) is assigned one of the following rules:
- MC (mudança de capítulo) — change of chapter: all non-originating materials must be classified in a different HS chapter (two-digit level) from the finished good.
- MP (mudança de posição) — change of heading: all non-originating materials must be classified in a different HS heading (four-digit level) from the finished good.
- MSP (mudança de subposição) — change of subheading: all non-originating materials must be classified in a different HS subheading (six-digit level) from the finished good.
- MaxMNO (valor máximo de materiais não originários) — maximum value of non-originating materials, expressed as a percentage of the ex-works price of the finished good.
The general MaxMNO threshold for Mercosul origin under CMC Decision 05/23 is 45% for industrial products and for 80.5% of agricultural products (measured against the list in Appendix II). This represents a five-percentage-point increase from the prior 40% threshold under CMC Decision 01/09, a change that Brazilian industry federations (including the Confederação Nacional da Indústria — CNI) had advocated for years as essential to fostering regional value chains. In practical terms, a good may incorporate up to 45% (by value) of third-country materials and still qualify as Mercosul-originating, provided the remaining production and value-addition occur within the four member states.
For the 19.5% of agricultural products marked with an **asterisk () in Appendix II, the MaxMNO threshold remains 40%*; these are products for which the Mercosul states judged that a higher third-country content would undermine the policy objective of intra-bloc agricultural integration.
## Differential treatment — Paraguay and Uruguay
Under CMC Decision 06/23 (promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 12.059 of 13 June 2024), Paraguay and Uruguay — the two smaller, less-developed economies in Mercosul — receive more-favourable MaxMNO thresholds to compensate for their smaller industrial base and limited domestic input availability. For the product-specific rules of origin marked with an asterisk in Appendix II:
- Paraguay: MaxMNO of 60% (i.e., Paraguayan producers may use up to 60% third-country inputs and still claim Mercosul origin).
- Uruguay: MaxMNO of 50%.
- Argentina and Brazil: the general 45% (or 40% for the asterisked agricultural products).
This asymmetry — authorised by CMC Decision 16/07, which mandates that exports from Paraguay and Uruguay not face less favourable origin conditions than exports from other countries — aims to preserve the competitiveness of Paraguayan and Uruguayan exporters in intra-Mercosul trade.
## Third-country materials that have "complied with the Common External Tariff" (PTC)
Article 7 of CMC Decision 05/23 (codified in the annex to Decreto 12.058) provides that materials imported from third countries that have entered the territory of a Mercosul state and have complied with the Common External Tariff (Política Tarifária Comum — PTC) are treated as originating materials for the purpose of calculating origin in a subsequent production stage, provided they have received the electronic customs-clearance marker under CMC Decision 54/04 (the "double-taxation elimination" regime, regulated by CMC Decision 37/05). In effect, once a third-country input has paid the Mercosul common external tariff on first entry into one member state and received the electronic Certificado de Cumprimento do Regime de Origem Mercosul (CCROM), that input is "nationalised" for the purpose of subsequent intra-Mercosul trade, and its value does not count against the MaxMNO threshold in the next manufacturing stage. This provision incentivises consolidation of supply chains at the bloc level.
## Insufficient operations
Article 8 of CMC Decision 05/23 lists operations that are insufficient to confer origin, even when performed in a Mercosul state. These include: operations to preserve goods during transport or storage (ventilation, refrigeration, drying, removal of damaged parts); simple assembly or disassembly; packaging, repackaging, or presentation for retail sale; simple mixing of materials; slaughter of animals; simple dilution in water or another substance that does not materially alter the character of the good; simple painting or polishing; and combinations of the foregoing. If the only operations performed in Mercosul are on the insufficient-operations list and the materials used are exclusively non-originating, the good does not acquire Mercosul origin.
## Cumulation
Bilateral cumulation operates automatically among the four Mercosul states: materials originating in one member state retain their originating status when incorporated into a good produced in another member state. Diagonal cumulation with materials originating in countries of the Andean Community (CAN — Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia) is governed by CMC Decision 41/03 and GMC Resolution 37/04: CAN-originating materials may be treated as Mercosul-originating for the purpose of the origin calculation, provided the bilateral ACE (Economic Complementation Agreement) between Mercosul and the relevant Andean country contains a definitive origin rule for that material and the final good achieves the minimum regional-value-content threshold specified in that ACE.
## Entry into force and transition
CMC Decision 05/23 was adopted at the 62nd Mercosul Summit in Puerto Iguazú, Argentina, on 3 July 2023. Article 5 of the Decision required the four member states to incorporate it into national law before 1 January 2024. Brazil completed incorporation by Decreto 12.058 of 13 June 2024. The 218th Additional Protocol to ACE 18 entered into force 30 days after the ALADI Secretariat-General (Asociación Latino-Americana de Integración) notified the signatory countries that it had received confirmation from the Mercosul Secretariat that all four states had incorporated the Decision and its companion Decision 06/23. That notification occurred in mid-June 2024, and the new regime became operative on 18 July 2024. Article 2 of CMC Decision 05/23 provides a twelve-month grace period (until 18 July 2025) during which certificates of origin using the old form from CMC Decision 01/09 will continue to be accepted, to facilitate the transition for trade operators.
CMC Decision 05/23 revoked CMC Decision 01/09, GMC Resolution 37/14, and a series of CCM Directives (04/10, 05/10, 14/10, 07/11, 16/11, 33/14, 39/18, 72/18, 37/19, 38/19, 56/19, and 142/21). Decreto 12.058 simultaneously revoked eleven prior Additional Protocols to ACE 18 (Nos. 18.77, 18.83, 18.94, 18.99, 18.106, 18.159, 18.180, 18.182, 18.183, 18.194, and 18.217).
Source: Decreto 12.058 de 13 de junho de 2024 (Incorpora CMC Decisão 05/23 — Regime de Origem Mercosul) Source: Decreto 12.059 de 13 de junho de 2024 (Incorpora CMC Decisão 06/23 — Tratamento diferenciado Paraguai e Uruguai) Source: MDIC Siscomex — Mercosul (ACE 18) — Regime de Origem CMC 05/23
Certificate-of-origin issuance and self-declaration procedures for Mercosul
Brazilian exporters claiming preferential tariff treatment for goods shipped to Mercosul partners (Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay) must provide proof of origin to the importer in the destination country. Under the Mercosul Origin Regime (Regime de Origem Mercosul — ROM) established by CMC Decision 05/23 and incorporated into Brazilian law by Decreto 12.058 of 13 June 2024, exporters may now choose between two methods for proving origin: the traditional Certificate of Origin (Certificado de Origem) issued by an authorised certifying entity, or a Declaration of Origin (Declaração de Origem) — a self-certification completed directly by the exporter or producer on the commercial invoice or another commercial document.
This dual-system approach allows each exporter to choose the method that suits its compliance infrastructure. The new regime took effect on 18 July 2024, with a twelve-month transitional period (until 18 July 2025) during which certificates of origin issued under the old CMC Decision 01/09 form remain valid (Article 2 of CMC Decision 05/23).
## Method 1: Traditional Certificate of Origin issued by authorised entities
The Certificate of Origin is a formal document issued by entities authorised by SECEX (the Secretariat of Foreign Trade) to certify that goods comply with Mercosul origin rules. Authorised certifying entities are designated by SECEX and include state-level Federations of Industry (such as FIESP in São Paulo, FIRJAN in Rio de Janeiro), Federations of Trade Associations (such as FecomercioSP), and Chambers of Commerce and Commercial Associations at state or municipal level. SECEX publishes the list of authorised certifying entities and their credentialed officials; certificates signed by non-authorised entities or non-credentialed individuals are invalid.
The model Certificate of Origin for Mercosul is prescribed in Appendix III to CMC Decision 05/23; it must be completed following the instructions in Appendix IV. The certificate is issued per commercial invoice: each export transaction requires a separate certificate. A Mercosul certificate of origin is valid for 180 days from the date of issuance.
To obtain a certificate, the exporter or producer prepares a Producer's Sworn Declaration (Declaração Juramentada do Produtor) containing the information necessary to substantiate the origin claim — materials used, production operations performed, tariff classification, calculation of the MaxMNO or demonstration of tariff shift — and submits it to the authorised certifying entity along with supporting documentation. The certifying entity reviews the declaration and issues the certificate. Under the new regime, the certificate form includes a field for the number and date of the Producer's Sworn Declaration, creating an audit trail linking the certificate to its underlying documentation (Appendix III, field 12).
Certificates of Origin under the Mercosul regime are available in both paper and digital formats. The Digital Certificate of Origin (Certificado de Origem Digital — COD) is an XML-format electronic document that carries the same legal force as a paper certificate. Since 18 July 2025, all Digital Certificates of Origin must be uploaded and validated through the LPCO module of the Portal Único Siscomex (the Integrated Foreign Trade System); the legacy Siscoimagem system was retired for COD purposes after that date (Receita Federal Comunicado Importação 068/2025).
## Method 2: Self-certification via Declaration of Origin
The Declaration of Origin (Declaração de Origem) permits the exporter or producer to attest to origin directly, without the intermediation of a certifying entity, by including prescribed origin information on the commercial invoice, delivery note, or other commercial document accompanying the shipment.
The regulatory framework for self-certification in Brazil is set out in Portaria SECEX 373 of 18 December 2024, which amended Portaria SECEX 249/2023 (the omnibus regulation governing origin certificates and procedures). Portaria 373/2024 authorises self-certification for Brazilian free-trade agreements that permit it; for Mercosul exports, Brazilian exporters and producers may issue Declarations of Origin under Article 54-A of Portaria 249/2023 (as amended).
Minimum required information for a Mercosul Declaration of Origin is specified in Appendix V to CMC Decision 05/23, and the detailed instructions for completing it appear in Appendix VI. The declaration must include:
- Name, address, email, and telephone of the exporter;
- Name, address, email, and telephone of the producer (if different from the exporter, or if there are multiple producers, a list of producers with the prescribed information; the exporter may declare "Available upon request by the competent authorities" if confidentiality of the producer's identity is desired);
- Description and tariff classification of the product according to the Nomenclatura Comum do Mercosul (NCM), at the 8-digit level; the description must be sufficiently detailed to match the product on the commercial invoice;
- The origin criterion under which the good qualifies (wholly obtained, change of tariff classification, MaxMNO, or cumulation);
- Signature of the exporter or authorised representative;
- Date of the declaration.
The declaration is typed or printed directly onto the invoice or delivery note, or attached as a separate sheet referencing the invoice. The exporter does not need prior authorisation from SECEX to begin self-certifying; the regime operates on a presumption of truthfulness with ex-post verification.
## Record-keeping and verification obligations
Under Article 54-B of Portaria SECEX 249/2023 (as amended by Portaria 373/2024), exporters and producers who issue Declarations of Origin must retain all supporting records for a minimum of five years from the date of issuance of the declaration. Supporting records include bills of materials, invoices and import declarations for inputs, production worksheets, calculations of regional value content, and any other documentation necessary to substantiate the origin claim.
SECEX's Department of International Negotiations (DEINT) has authority under Article 54-B, paragraph 2 to conduct technical visits to the facilities of exporters and producers who issue Declarations of Origin, and to access all records required to verify the accuracy of the origin claim. If SECEX determines that a declaration was false or insufficiently supported, the exporter or producer is subject to administrative sanctions under Article 54-C of Portaria 249/2023, without prejudice to any sanctions imposed by the importing country under the trade agreement. Sanctions include suspension from self-certification for a period determined by SECEX; during the suspension period, the exporter may still obtain Certificates of Origin from authorised certifying entities under the traditional procedure (Article 54-C, sole paragraph).
Exporters who use the traditional Certificate of Origin route face equivalent record-retention requirements: the Producer's Sworn Declaration and supporting documentation must be retained by the producer and made available to SECEX or to the importing country's verification authorities upon request.
## Importer's obligations and customs acceptance
Brazilian importers claiming Mercosul preferential tariff treatment must present valid proof of origin to the Receita Federal do Brasil (RFB), the federal customs authority, at the time of import clearance. Acceptable proof of origin includes:
- A Certificate of Origin (paper or digital) issued by an authorised certifying entity in the exporting Mercosul state;
- A Declaration of Origin completed by the exporter or producer on the commercial invoice or delivery note;
- For goods that have entered the Mercosul customs territory from a third country and complied with the Mercosul Common External Tariff (Política Tarifária Comum — PTC) under CMC Decision 54/04 and 37/05, a Certificate of Compliance with the Common External Tariff (Certificado de Cumprimento da Política Tarifária Comum — CCPTC) or a Certificate of Compliance with the Mercosul Origin Regime (Certificado de Cumprimento do Regime de Origem Mercosul — CCROM), which is an alphanumeric code generated by SISCOMEX or the equivalent system in the other Mercosul state and entered into the import declaration; this code "nationalises" the third-country input for purposes of Mercosul origin cumulation (Receita Federal guidance on CCPTC and CCROM).
The importer must retain the proof of origin for audit purposes. Receita Federal guidance indicates that certain certificate defects — such as a certificate lacking the certifying entity's seal or signature, a certificate issued by a non-authorised entity, a certificate emitted by a non-credentialed official, or a certificate dated more than 60 days after the commercial invoice — are non-rectifiable and may lead to denial of the tariff preference or a requirement to post a guarantee pending resolution. Minor errors that do not affect the substance of the origin claim may be rectified through supplementary certification by the exporting country's authority; substantive errors require issuance of a new certificate or declaration.
## Comparison: certificate vs. self-declaration
The choice between the two methods is a compliance and cost tradeoff:
- Certificate of Origin (issued by authorised entity): the exporter must submit a Producer's Sworn Declaration and wait for entity review and issuance; certifying entities may charge a fee per certificate (though the digital COD is often issued at lower or zero cost); the certificate benefits from the authority and credibility of the certifying entity's seal.
- Declaration of Origin (self-certification): zero issuance fee; immediate issuance by the exporter at the time of shipment; but the exporter assumes full legal responsibility for the accuracy of the origin claim and must maintain robust internal compliance procedures and record-keeping to withstand SECEX technical visits and foreign verification requests.
SECEX's Department of International Negotiations (DEINT) has published a Self-Certification Guide (Guia de Autocertificação) providing step-by-step instructions for Brazilian exporters on how to prepare a Declaration of Origin, which records to retain, and how to respond to a foreign verification request; the guide is available on the SISCOMEX portal.
Source: Decreto 12.058 de 13 de junho de 2024 (Incorpora CMC Decisão 05/23 — Regime de Origem Mercosul) Source: Portaria SECEX 373 de 18 de dezembro de 2024 (Altera Portaria 249/2023 — Autocertificação de origem) Source: MDIC/SISCOMEX — Mercosul (ACE 18) — Regime de Origem CMC 05/23 Source: Receita Federal — Prova de Origem (Importações Mercosul)
Non-preferential rules of origin — WTO substantial-transformation test and trade-remedy enforcement
Brazil's non-preferential rules of origin determine the country of origin for goods imported from countries with which Brazil has no preferential trade agreement — for example, imports from the United States, China, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, and the European Union (with which Brazil's pending EU–Mercosul FTA has not yet entered into force as of June 2026). Non-preferential origin rules are critical for the administration of anti-dumping and countervailing duties, safeguard measures, import quotas, country-of-origin marking requirements, government-procurement nationality restrictions, and trade-remedy enforcement under Brazilian law.
The legal framework is anchored in Article 9 of Decree-Law 37 of 18 November 1966 (the Customs Duties Law), the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin (promulgated in Brazil by Decree 1.355 of 30 December 1994), and CAMEX Resolution 80 of 9 November 2010, which prescribes the operational criteria for determining non-preferential origin. CAMEX Resolution 80/2010 was adopted to harmonize Brazil's non-preferential origin regime with the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin and to ensure transparent, predictable, and consistent application by the Receita Federal do Brasil (RFB) — the federal customs authority — and by the Secretariat of Foreign Trade (SECEX), which conducts special verification procedures when origin fraud is suspected in trade-remedy contexts.
## Wholly-obtained criterion
A good is deemed wholly obtained in a single country — and thus originating in that country for non-preferential purposes — if it falls within one of the enumerated categories in Article 2, paragraph 1 of CAMEX Resolution 80/2010. These categories include:
- Live animals born and raised in that country;
- Vegetable products (including plants, fruits, and agricultural produce) harvested or gathered in that country;
- Mineral products and other natural resources extracted from the soil, seabed, or subsoil of that country;
- Products of hunting, fishing, or aquaculture conducted in that country or in its territorial waters;
- Products of sea fishing and other products taken from the sea outside the country's territorial waters by vessels registered in that country, entitled to fly that country's flag, or by vessels chartered or leased to enterprises established in that country;
- Goods produced aboard factory ships from products obtained as described above, provided the factory ship is registered in that country;
- Waste and scrap resulting from manufacturing operations conducted in that country, and used articles collected there and fit only for the recovery of raw materials;
- Goods produced in that country exclusively from the products listed in the preceding items.
The wholly-obtained criterion is straightforward and applies primarily to unprocessed agricultural, mineral, and marine products.
## Substantial-transformation test — change of tariff heading at the four-digit HS level
When a good incorporates materials from multiple countries, Brazil applies a substantial-transformation test to determine the single country of origin. Under Article 2, paragraph 2 of CAMEX Resolution 80/2010, a good is deemed to have undergone substantial transformation — and thus to have acquired the origin of the country of final manufacture — if the production process results in the good being classified in a different tariff heading (the first four digits of the Harmonized System — HS) from the tariff headings of all the non-originating materials used in its production.
This is a pure tariff-change rule at the HS heading (4-digit) level. There is no regional-value-content threshold or minimum-processing requirement beyond the tariff-shift itself. For example, if non-originating steel sheet (HS 7209) is used to manufacture finished bicycles (HS 8712) in Brazil, the bicycles are of Brazilian origin because the tariff heading has changed from 72.09 to 87.12. Conversely, if non-originating bicycle frames (HS 8714.91) are assembled into complete bicycles (HS 8712.00), the tariff shift from heading 87.14 to heading 87.12 is sufficient to confer Brazilian origin — subject to the insufficient-operations exception described below.
The Nomenclatura Comum do Mercosul (NCM) — Brazil's eight-digit national implementation of the HS — is used for tariff classification, but the substantial-transformation test operates at the first four digits (the HS heading), not at the six-digit subheading or eight-digit national level. This relatively permissive threshold reflects Brazil's adherence to the WTO Agreement on Rules of Origin, which contemplates a harmonized tariff-change-based test for non-preferential origin pending completion of the WTO Harmonization Work Programme (which remains incomplete as of 2026).
## Insufficient operations — anti-circumvention provision
Even when a change of tariff heading occurs, Article 2, paragraph 3 of CAMEX Resolution 80/2010 provides that a good is not considered originating in the country of final processing if the operations performed there consist only of the following, and the materials used are exclusively non-originating:
- Assembly (montagem) of components or parts;
- Packaging, repackaging, or presentation for retail sale (embalagem, reembalagem, ou apresentação para venda a retalho);
- Fractionation into lots or volumes (fracionamento em lotes ou volumes);
- Selection, classification, or marking (seleção, classificação, ou marcação);
- Composition of assortments of goods (composição de sortimentos de mercadorias);
- Simple dilution in water or another substance that does not materially alter the characteristics of the product (simples diluições em água ou outra substância que não altere as características do produto);
- Other equivalent operations (outras operações ou processos equivalentes).
This anti-circumvention clause is critical in trade-remedy enforcement. SECEX has invoked it in multiple origin-verification investigations to disqualify claimed origin when importers route goods through a third country solely to perform minimal assembly or repackaging in order to evade anti-dumping duties. The burden rests on the importer to demonstrate that the processing in the claimed country of origin went beyond the insufficient-operations list and achieved genuine substantial transformation.
## Special verification procedure for non-preferential origin (SECEX Portaria 38/2015)
When Receita Federal or SECEX identifies a risk of origin fraud — typically when imports of goods subject to anti-dumping or countervailing duties arrive with declarations of origin from third countries that are not themselves subject to the duty — SECEX may initiate a special verification procedure for non-preferential origin under Portaria SECEX 38 of 18 May 2015 (as amended).
The procedure authorizes SECEX to:
- Request detailed origin declarations and supporting documentation from the foreign exporter, including bills of materials, production flowcharts, cost breakdowns, import declarations for inputs, and contracts with suppliers;
- Conduct on-site verification visits at the exporter's production facilities abroad (subject to the consent of the exporting country's government);
- Issue a determination qualifying or disqualifying the claimed origin, which is published in the Diário Oficial da União (DOU) and binds Receita Federal for customs clearance and duty assessment.
SECEX origin determinations issued under Portaria 38/2015 are administrative acts with immediate effect; they are subject to administrative appeal to SECEX's Department of International Negotiations (DEINT) and, ultimately, to judicial review before federal courts. In practice, SECEX has used the procedure extensively in cases involving Chinese-origin goods routed through Southeast Asian countries (Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia) with minimal processing to evade Brazil's extensive anti-dumping-duty portfolio on Chinese manufactures.
## Application in trade-remedy enforcement
Non-preferential origin rules determine which exports are "originating" in the country subject to an anti-dumping or countervailing duty. When SECEX concludes an anti-dumping investigation and CAMEX (now GECEX, the Executive Management Committee) imposes a definitive anti-dumping duty on imports "originating in" a specified country, that duty applies only to goods that satisfy the non-preferential origin test for that country under CAMEX Resolution 80/2010.
Importers have an incentive to re-route goods through third countries and perform minimal operations to cause a change of tariff heading, thereby claiming third-country origin and evading the duty. SECEX's enforcement posture has been to scrutinize such arrangements closely, invoke the insufficient-operations clause when warranted, and issue disqualification determinations that reclassify the goods as originating in the country subject to the duty. The retroactive application of such determinations can trigger substantial duty assessments, penalties, and potential criminal liability for customs fraud under Brazilian law.
## Relationship to preferential origin
Non-preferential origin rules apply by default to all imports for which the importer does not claim preferential tariff treatment under a free-trade agreement or regional-integration instrument. When an importer presents valid proof of preferential origin (a certificate of origin or self-declaration under Mercosul, ALADI, or another FTA), the preferential origin rules of the relevant agreement govern; non-preferential rules are irrelevant to the tariff-preference claim. However, if the importer's preferential-origin claim is denied (for example, because the good fails the agreement's regional-value-content test), Receita Federal falls back to the non-preferential origin rules to determine the country of origin for purposes of applying the most-favoured-nation (MFN) tariff rate under Brazil's national tariff schedule (the Tarifa Externa Comum — TEC, for Mercosul member states, or Brazil's national deviations from the TEC).
## Currency and amendments
CAMEX Resolution 80/2010 was published in the Diário Oficial da União on 10 November 2010. Subsequent SECEX portarias and GECEX resolutions have amended procedural aspects of origin verification, but the substantive wholly-obtained and substantial-transformation criteria in CAMEX Resolution 80/2010 remain the operative framework as of June 2026. Practitioners should consult SECEX's Regimes de Origem page on the Ministry of Development, Industry, Trade, and Services (MDIC) portal for the latest consolidated text and for lists of active origin-verification investigations.
Source: MDIC — Regimes de Origem (CAMEX Resolução 80/2010; SECEX Portaria 38/2015) Source: SECEX Portaria 344 de 8 de agosto de 2024 — Verificação de origem não preferencial (demonstrating non-preferential origin rules in application)
ALADI framework and Brazil's Economic Complementation Agreements (ACEs)
Brazil's preferential trade agreements with most of Latin America are negotiated and administered through the Associação Latino-Americana de Integração (ALADI) — the Latin American Integration Association — a regional integration organization established by the Treaty of Montevideo 1980 (Tratado de Montevidéu 1980), promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 87.054 of 23 March 1982. ALADI provides the legal and institutional framework for Brazil to negotiate Economic Complementation Agreements (Acordos de Complementação Econômica — ACEs) and Partial Scope Agreements (Acordos de Alcance Parcial) with other member countries, enabling tariff preferences and regulatory cooperation on a bilateral or plurilateral basis.
The original ALADI signatories to the Treaty of Montevideo 1980 were Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela. ALADI currently has 13 member countries (the 11 originals plus Cuba and Panama). The association's objective is to promote regional economic integration and the gradual establishment of a Latin American common market through incremental preferential agreements among subsets of members, with the ultimate goal of progressive multilateralization.
## Treaty of Montevideo 1980 — types of agreements
The Treaty of Montevideo 1980 authorizes member states to negotiate three categories of preferential agreements:
- Regional Scope Agreements (Acordos de Alcance Regional — AAR), in which all ALADI members participate. The principal Regional Scope Agreement is the Regional Tariff Preference Agreement No. 4 (APTR 04), which establishes a minimum tariff preference that all members grant to one another on specified product lists.
- Partial Scope Agreements (Acordos de Alcance Parcial — AAP), which do not require participation of all members and may cover specific sectors or themes, such as trade in seeds, cultural goods, or environmental goods.
- Economic Complementation Agreements (Acordos de Complementação Econômica — ACEs), the most flexible and widely used instrument. ACEs are negotiated among subsets of ALADI members and may range from simple preferential tariff schedules on limited product lists to comprehensive free-trade agreements covering the entire tariff universe, services, investment, government procurement, and other trade disciplines.
Under Article 7 of the Treaty of Montevideo 1980, ACEs are intended to promote the development of member countries through the complementarity of their productive systems, and the progressive multilateralization of ACE commitments is encouraged to deepen regional integration.
## ACE 18 — Mercosul's legal foundation within ALADI
ACE 18, signed on 29 November 1991 in Montevideo and promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 550 of 27 May 1992, is the Economic Complementation Agreement among Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay that formalizes the Mercosul customs union within the ALADI framework. All Mercosul decisions — including the Mercosul Common External Tariff, the Mercosul origin regime (most recently updated by CMC Decision 05/23, incorporated into ACE 18 by the 218th Additional Protocol and promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 12.058 of 13 June 2024), and intra-Mercosul trade-defense disciplines — are incorporated into Brazilian law as Additional Protocols to ACE 18, which are then deposited with the ALADI Secretariat-General. This dual architecture allows Mercosul to function as a customs union while maintaining ALADI's multilateral preference framework and enabling Mercosul as a bloc to negotiate ACEs with third countries.
## Brazil's principal bilateral and plurilateral ACEs (outside Mercosul)
Brazil participates in more than a dozen ACEs negotiated either bilaterally or as part of Mercosul. The most commercially significant include:
**ACE 35 — Mercosul–Chile**
Signed in June 1996 and promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 2.075 of 19 November 1996, ACE 35 was the first free-trade agreement negotiated by Mercosul with a third country, making Chile an associated state of Mercosul. SISCOMEX reports that the agreement achieved zero tariffs on 100% of the tariff universe (6,811 lines) for trade between Brazil and Chile as of 2015, with the nomenclature updated to NALADI/SH 2012 by Decreto 9.389 of 29 May 2018. ACE 35 was substantially expanded in 2018 by the 64th Additional Protocol (the "Brazil–Chile Free Trade Agreement"), which added disciplines on trade facilitation, services, investment, electronic commerce, government procurement, and technical barriers to trade.
**ACE 36 — Mercosul–Bolivia**
Signed in December 1996 and promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 2.240 of 8 June 1997, ACE 36 establishes a free-trade area between Mercosul and Bolivia (now the Plurinational State of Bolivia). Bolivia was authorized by the Andean Community to negotiate separately with Mercosul; the other Andean Community members negotiated collectively under ACE 59.
**ACE 58 — Mercosul–Peru**
Signed on 30 November 2005 and promulgated in Brazil by Decreto 5.651 of 29 December 2005, ACE 58 entered into force for Brazil and Peru on 2 January 2006. SISCOMEX reports that the agreement's tariff-elimination schedule was completed in January 2019, achieving zero tariffs on 6,524 codes (covering 100% of the tariff universe), except for twelve tariff codes covering sugar, alcohol, tires, and certain textile articles, which remain excluded from the liberalization program. The completion of ACE 58's tariff elimination, together with the earlier completion of ACE schedules with Colombia, Ecuador, Chile, and Bolivia, created a de facto South American free-trade area linking Brazil with all its continental neighbors. ACE 58 includes anti-dumping and countervailing-duty disciplines (Title V), bilateral safeguards (Annex VI), and product-specific rules of origin (Annex V, Appendix 1).
**ACE 59 — Mercosul–CAN (Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela)**
ACE 59, signed in 2004, established free-trade commitments between Mercosul and the Andean Community countries of Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela (Venezuela subsequently withdrew from the Andean Community and joined Mercosul, though its Mercosul accession remains suspended). The agreement's origin rules permit diagonal cumulation with Bolivia and Peru (also Andean Community members covered by ACEs 36 and 58, respectively), allowing materials originating in one Andean country or one Mercosul country to be treated as originating when incorporated into a good produced in another signatory country.
**ACE 53 — Brazil–Mexico (non-automotive)**
ACE 53 is a bilateral agreement between Brazil and Mexico covering all products except automotive goods (which are governed by the separate Mercosul–Mexico ACE 55). Brazil and Mexico have been engaged in multiple rounds of negotiation since 2015 to expand and deepen ACE 53, with the goal of achieving broader tariff liberalization and incorporating disciplines on services, investment, trade facilitation, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, and government procurement. The expansion has not yet entered into force as of June 2026; the existing ACE 53 schedule provides preferential tariff access on a positive list of products.
**ACE 55 — Mercosul–Mexico (automotive)**
ACE 55, negotiated collectively by Mercosul and Mexico, governs trade in automotive vehicles and parts. In March 2019, ACE 55 achieved free trade in the automotive sector between Brazil and Mexico, eliminating tariffs on passenger vehicles, light trucks, heavy trucks, buses, and a wide range of automotive components. The agreement includes specific origin rules for the automotive sector and provisions on regulatory cooperation to harmonize vehicle-safety and environmental standards.
**ACE 62 — Mercosul–Cuba**
Signed in 2006, ACE 62 provides for preferential tariff treatment on positive lists of products traded between Mercosul and Cuba. Tariff preferences are fixed (not progressive elimination), reflecting the different economic systems and trade structures of the parties.
**ACE 2 — Brazil–Uruguay (bilateral, predating Mercosul)**
ACE 2, signed on 20 December 1982, is one of the oldest ALADI agreements and provided for preferential trade between Brazil and Uruguay before both countries became founding members of Mercosul in 1991. After the entry into force of Mercosul (ACE 18), most trade between Brazil and Uruguay has been governed by the Mercosul zero-tariff regime; however, ACE 2 remains formally in force and has been amended by numerous Additional Protocols, including the Protocol of Commercial Expansion (Protocolo de Expansão Comercial — PEC). For practical purposes, ACE 2 is now superseded by ACE 18 for tariff preferences, but it continues to serve as a legal framework for bilateral regulatory cooperation on standards, SPS measures, and cross-border services that are not yet harmonized at the Mercosul level.
**ACE 14 — Brazil–Argentina (bilateral, predating Mercosul)**
ACE 14, signed on 20 December 1990, is the bilateral Economic Complementation Agreement between Brazil and Argentina that served as the immediate precursor to Mercosul. Following the entry into force of the Treaty of Asunción (1991) and ACE 18, trade between Brazil and Argentina has been governed by the Mercosul regime; however, ACE 14 remains in the ALADI treaty registry and has been amended by more than forty Additional Protocols addressing sector-specific issues, including the 45th Additional Protocol (promulgated by Decreto 11.743 of 25 September 2023), which incorporated a Mutual Recognition Agreement on Vehicle Approvals to eliminate duplicative vehicle-homologation testing for passenger cars, light commercial vehicles, and heavy vehicles traded between the two countries. ACE 14 is now primarily a framework for bilateral regulatory cooperation in the automotive, pharmaceutical, and technical-standards sectors, complementing the broader Mercosul disciplines.
## Depositary function and entry into force
The ALADI Secretariat-General in Montevideo serves as the depositary for all ACEs and their Additional Protocols. Each ACE and Additional Protocol enters into force 30 days after the Secretariat-General notifies the signatory countries that it has received confirmation from all parties that the agreement has been incorporated into their national legal systems. In Brazil, incorporation occurs by presidential decree (after congressional approval if required), and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Itamaraty) notifies ALADI of the decree's publication. Numerous Brazilian decrees incorporating ACE Additional Protocols recite this procedural framework, including Decreto 12.058 of 13 June 2024 (218th Additional Protocol to ACE 18) and Decreto 12.059 of 13 June 2024 (219th Additional Protocol to ACE 18).
## Practical significance for Brazilian importers and exporters
Brazilian importers claiming preferential tariff treatment under an ACE must present valid proof of origin to Receita Federal at the time of customs clearance. The form of proof of origin — certificate issued by an authorized certifying entity, digital certificate, or self-declaration — depends on the specific ACE and is prescribed in the agreement's origin annex. For example, ACE 58 (Mercosul–Peru) uses a certificate-of-origin model similar to Mercosul's (Annex V to the ACE), while ACE 35 (Mercosul–Chile) permits both certificates and self-declarations under the 64th Additional Protocol's facilitation provisions.
Brazilian exporters must ensure that goods comply with the product-specific rules of origin of the relevant ACE. Each ACE has a distinct origin regime, and the rules for a given tariff line under ACE 35 (Mercosul–Chile) may differ from the rules for the same tariff line under ACE 58 (Mercosul–Peru) or under the Mercosul intra-bloc regime (CMC Decision 05/23). SECEX maintains a consolidated tariff-preference query tool within the SISCOMEX portal (accessible at www.gov.br/siscomex), allowing exporters to look up the applicable tariff preference and origin rule for any NCM code under any ACE in which Brazil participates.
ALADI supports a Digital Certificate of Origin system enabling authorized certifying entities in member countries to issue, transmit, and validate certificates of origin in electronic format, reducing paperwork and clearance times for intra-ALADI trade.
Source: Decreto 87.054 de 23 de março de 1982 (Promulga o Tratado de Montevidéu 1980 — ALADI) Source: Decreto 5.651 de 29 de dezembro de 2005 (Promulga ACE 58 — Mercosul–Peru) Source: Decreto 12.058 de 13 de junho de 2024 (Incorpora CMC Decisão 05/23 — Regime de Origem Mercosul, 218º Protocolo Adicional ao ACE 18) Source: Decreto 11.743 de 25 de setembro de 2023 (Incorpora 45º Protocolo Adicional ao ACE 14 — Reconhecimento Mútuo de Homologações Veiculares Brasil-Argentina) Source: MDIC/SISCOMEX — ALADI (overview of ALADI framework and Brazil's ACE agreements) Source: MDIC/SISCOMEX — Mercosul–Chile (ACE 35) Source: MDIC/SISCOMEX — Mercosul–Peru (ACE 58)