A new duty taking effect on 1 July is expected to generate as much as €15 million in revenue for Cyprus, the Customs Department's spokesperson, Customs Officer A Giorgos Konstantinou, told CNA. The €3 charge will apply per product category to packages valued under €150 entering the EU from third countries, a category of goods typically bought online that had until now been exempt from duties altogether.
According to Customs Department figures, Cyprus received an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 low-value parcels a month through September 2025, equivalent to roughly 40,000 to 60,000 shipments a year. Konstantinou explained to CNA that this figure was misleading, since platforms had been unable to file declarations directly with Cyprus's customs system before that point and instead submitted them in other EU member states, meaning the parcels appeared as imports elsewhere in Europe. Once Cyprus upgraded its systems in October 2025 and began accepting declarations directly from platforms, shipments started arriving straight from China to Cyprus instead.
The shift produced a dramatic jump in volume. "Since October 2025, there has been an explosive increase in package arrivals and low-value declarations, due to direct shipping from third-country platforms to Cyprus, mainly Temu and Shein, and the acceptance of customs declarations in the department's import system, which until September 2025 were processed in other member states," Konstantinou said. Since October, monthly low-value parcel arrivals have ranged between 250,000 and 350,000, with a slight dip in April to 188,000. Over the nine months from October to June, 2,556,326 parcels valued under €150 arrived in Cyprus from non-EU countries.
"From these numbers it's clear the workload for the Customs Department has nearly quintupled since last October, as we expect to go from an average of 60,000 low-value parcels a year to 3 to 3.5 million parcels a year," Konstantinou said. Department data shows 90% of low-value parcels arriving in Cyprus originate in China, with about 5% from the United States, roughly 4% from the United Kingdom, and the remaining 1% spread across the United Arab Emirates, Japan, Vietnam, India, Hong Kong, South Korea and Bangladesh.
Asked about expected revenue, Konstantinou said that factoring in an average of three to five different product items per parcel, the duty is expected to bring in roughly €10 to 15 million a year in import revenue, of which 75% will go to EU coffers and the remaining 25% will stay with the Republic of Cyprus to cover administrative costs.
The European Commission has said the duty is intended to help level the playing field for EU businesses, better protect consumers from unsafe products, combat customs fraud and address environmental concerns linked to the mass shipping of parcels, arguing it will discourage the practice by raising the cost of very low-value orders. Asked whether the department expects shipment volumes to fall once the duty takes effect, Konstantinou said arrivals are expected to remain around 300,000 parcels a month. With the average parcel value sitting at roughly €70, he said that even with the new duty, a parcel containing two or three different items would only rise to about €82, still an attractive price, and the department does not anticipate a significant drop in demand. "Perhaps trade patterns will correct slightly, with duties being paid on all goods coming into Cyprus," he said.
Explaining how the system will work in practice, Konstantinou said large platforms are contracted with courier companies in Cyprus that handle deliveries. From 1 July, any parcel arriving in Cyprus will be subject to the duty; where it has not already been applied, courier companies will collect it before delivering the parcel and remit it to customs. He noted that Temu and Shein had already adjusted their pricing as of June to incorporate the duty at the point of purchase, meaning the charge will appear on the customs declaration and recipients should not need to pay anything extra upon collecting their parcel.
Addressing the public directly, Konstantinou asked for "patience and understanding, especially in the first days after the duty takes effect," describing it as a new measure whose full impact on volume and potential delays remains uncertain even to the department itself. He said the situation should stabilise within roughly ten days, giving a clearer picture of how the system will function, and that any incorrect charges identified can be corrected through coordination with the department.
Source: Cyprus News Agency
