Describes trade agreements this country is a party to. Includes resources where U.S. companies can get information on how to take advantage of these agreements.
The Republic of Korea and the United States implemented the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement on March 15, 2012 (amended in September 2018). The Agreement is the largest Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiated by the United States since NAFTA. For more information about the KORUS FTA, please visit https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements/korus-fta.
The Republic of Korea is a member Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum. One goal of APEC, as outlined in its 1994 declaration, is to establish a Free Trade Area among its member countries by the year 2020. Substantive principles of the APEC Forum include investment liberalization, tariff reduction, deregulation, government procurement, and strengthening IPR protection. Korea was the host country for the APEC Summit in 2005.
Korea has 18 Free Trade Agreements with ASEAN, Australia, Canada, Central America (Partial), Chile, China, Colombia, European Free Trade Association (Norway, Switzerland, Iceland and Liechtenstein), European Union, India, New Zealand, Peru, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), Singapore, U.K., U.S., Turkey and Vietnam. For the complete list of Korea’s FTAs, please visit the Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs site (https://www.fta.go.kr//main/situation/kfta/ov/). More information on the EU-Korea FTA can be found on the European Union website at https://policy.trade.ec.europa.eu/index_en.
The Republic of Korea is a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and has signed subsidiary agreements including TRIPs (Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property) and the Government Procurement Agreement. Korea has been a member of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) since December 1996.
To take advantage of an FTA, please visit the FTA Help Center.