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Chilean-based LATAM Airlines Group, operating within Miami International Airport’s foreign trade zone (FTZ), has begun shipping aircraft parts from Chile to its maintenance facility at MIA for repair and returning them to Chile, without paying federal import taxes.
The trade zone allows airport tenants to import materials that can be manufactured, repaired, or stored anywhere on airport property, with the federal tariffs on those materials deferred, reduced, or eliminated, providing valuable time and cost savings.
LATAM is the first approved operator within the airport’s trade zone magnet site.
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Cava Levine, in a release, identified LATAM has the county’s “launch partner in this innovative program at MIA.”
“MIA is already the leading U.S. airport for international freight,” the mayor said, “and its FTZ magnet site creates yet another competitive advantage for airlines and businesses looking to expand their operations…”
LATAM group, the largest airline company in Latin America, began in 2010 with the merger of Chile’s LAN-Chile and Brazil’s TAM Linhas Aéreas. The company’s is headquartered in Santiago.
Companies within the FTZ can defer paying duties until the products exit the site, reduce duties on combined finished products instead of on each individual product, and eliminate duties on products being imported to the site and then re-exported.
“We are very proud … to be the first airline to achieve this important certification at MIA,” said Richard Zuniga, supply chain and logistics director at LATAM Airlines USA, in the release.
“This opens the door to significant benefits and savings opportunities for cross-docking technical materials entering and leaving the United States,” Mr. Zuniga said. “In the long run, this certification is going to provide LATAM Airlines with further opportunities to expand in the FTZ.”
Airport Director and CEO Ralph Cutié said the airport applied for the magnet designation “to make MIA even more cost-efficient for our cargo partners.” The designation “opens the door to a variety of time- and cost-saving opportunities for cargo handlers at MIA,” he said.
The airport’s magnet site, approved by the US Department of Commerce before the pandemic, is an expansion of the county’s existing magnet site at PortMiami.
https://www.miamitodaynews.com/2023/05/02/latam-airlines-beats-tariffs-at-mia-trade-zone/
