On June 16, the Korea Customs Service announced that it will release the "Korea-US Item Number Correlation Table" for steel products subject to US tariffs.
The publication of the correlation table follows the US administration's decision on June 12 to add 11 new items to the list of steel products subject to tariffs. The main items include refrigerators and freezers, dishwashers, washing machines, and dryers.
Under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, these products will be subject to a 50% tariff on the value of the steel content in the product, while the remaining non-steel portion will be subject to reciprocal tariffs.
The international standard item number (HS code), overseen by the World Customs Organization (WCO), is applied uniformly up to the six-digit level worldwide. However, from the seventh digit onward, each country operates its own system based on domestic circumstances.
As a result, even for the same product, the Korean item number used by domestic companies in export declarations and the US item number used by US importers in import declarations are often not identical.
To address this issue, the Korea Customs Service has linked the US item numbers (HTS) released by the US to the ten-digit Korean item numbers (HSK), allowing Korean exporters to identify which products are subject to tariffs based on the export declaration item number (HSK).
The item number correlation table can be found on the Korea Customs Service website.
An official from the Korea Customs Service stated, "We will continue to quickly monitor changes in US customs policy and provide relevant information to exporters, so that Korean exporters to the US do not suffer disadvantages due to discrepancies in item numbers."
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