India–EFTA TEPA: what Swiss machinery exporters need to know

The India–EFTA trade agreement has been in force since 1 October 2025. How Swiss machine builders find India's commitment for their HS line, what proves origin, and why a Swiss-made machine cannot use UK CETA rates.

5 min read · updated 2026-09-19

What TEPA is, and who it covers

The Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement between India and the four EFTA states — Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland — was signed on 10 March 2024 and entered into force on 1 October 2025 (s1; s2). It covers trade in goods, rules of origin, trade facilitation, services, investment promotion and cooperation, and intellectual property, among other chapters (s2). For a Swiss machine builder, the key point is that the agreement applies to goods originating in an EFTA state: Switzerland is India's largest EFTA trading partner, and India's offer to the EFTA states covers the large majority of their exports to India, while India protected sensitive sectors including pharma, medical devices, processed food, dairy, soya, coal and sensitive agricultural products (s2). Nothing in TEPA changes India's normal duty on a machine that originates outside the four states.

Finding India's commitment for your HS line

India's commitments are set out line by line in its schedule of tariff commitments on goods to the EFTA states: Annex 2C, with separate appendices for each partner and Appendix 2C.3 covering Switzerland (s4). That schedule — not a summary page, and not this article — is the only place a rate can be quoted from, and it is best read with the EFTA Secretariat's explanatory note on India's tariff commitment classifications (s4). Because a machine can sit on a line that is eliminated, reduced in stages over several years, or left out of the offer, look up the specific code and record the date you checked it. India's commerce ministry counted 7,885 preferential certificates of origin issued under TEPA after it became operational, which shows the preference being used in practice (s3).

Proof of origin

The preferential rate applies only to goods that originate in an EFTA state and meet TEPA's product-specific origin rules (Appendix 2A.1 to the rules of origin annex — s4). The agreement provides templates for an origin declaration, a certificate of origin and a movement certificate EUR.1, and India's commerce ministry describes TEPA as allowing exporters to establish origin through self-declaration (s4; s3). Shipping from Switzerland is not enough on its own: check the origin rule for your machine's HS code and keep the supporting records, because an origin claim can be audited after import.

A Swiss-made machine does not get UK CETA rates

The agreement you use is set by where the goods originate, not where your company or distributor is based. UK–India CETA applies to goods that originate in the UK (s5), so a Swiss-made machine is not a UK product and cannot claim the UK's schedule under CETA — just as a UK-made machine cannot claim TEPA. If your supply chain spans both, for example a Swiss parent with a UK assembly plant, treat the two as separate origin exercises: the UK plant's machine may qualify for CETA, and the Swiss plant's machine for TEPA, each under its own rules of origin and its own schedule (s4; s5).

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