Importing from China to India, Pakistan and Bangladesh in 2026

India imported $149.49 billion worth of Chinese goods in 2025 according to Comtrade, dominated by five categories accounting for roughly 75% of the total: electrical and electronic equipment ($56.98bn), machinery, reactors and boilers ($31.51bn), organic chemicals ($11.51bn), plastics ($6.83bn), and pearls and precious metals ($5.14bn). Concrete niches: assembly components, industrial machinery, chemical inputs, plastics, consumer goods.

In Pakistan, demand centers on the CPEC corridor, launched in April 2015 according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, directing flows toward energy, transport, infrastructure, textile machinery and consumer electronics. In Bangladesh, the driver remains garment manufacturing: a sector valued at $31.5 billion according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, with raw cotton and textile machinery classed as duty-exempt categories. No bilateral statistic isolates China's share of these imports: verify on Comtrade before drawing up any business plan.

Pakistan has a bilateral free trade agreement with China, alongside Sri Lanka and Malaysia; the tariff lines covered and their 2026 rates must be checked line by line. India and Bangladesh, by contrast, have no confirmed bilateral agreement: goods enter under most-favored-nation treatment.

In India, the trade-weighted average tariff stood at 5.22% in 2023 (WITS, World Bank); the Customs Act of 1962, under the authority of the CBIC, sets a cascading calculation: basic customs duty by tariff heading, a social welfare surcharge, then integrated goods and services tax. In Bangladesh, the average duty reaches 14.1% across all lines in 2025 according to the WTO, with a ceiling of 25%, plus a 5% advance income tax, VAT of 0 to 15%, and duties of up to 500% on luxury goods. In Pakistan, duties are calculated ad valorem by Harmonized System line, paid in rupees and changed frequently according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, plus a sales tax: no dated 2026 schedule was found, to be reconfirmed via WeBOC.

In India, the Bureau of Indian Standards, created by the BIS Act 2016, makes certification mandatory for a growing number of product categories, mainly electronics and IT, through the Compulsory Registration Scheme and its crsbis.in portal. The list is updated through successive orders, current through 2026, and must be checked product by product, with certification generally required to be obtained by the manufacturer. Costs and timelines have not been confirmed.

In Pakistan, the PSQCA, established by a 1996 law, publishes a list of items subject to mandatory certification and issues a PS Mark after testing; its fee schedule, last revised in August 2017, has no 2026 version on record. In Bangladesh, 55 product categories require a certificate to BDS standards according to the customs portal, with no published fee schedule at the source consulted. Common rule: verify certification status before starting production.

In India, the Import Export Code (IEC), issued by the Directorate General of Foreign Trade, is a mandatory identifier without which no import can take place; it is built on the company's permanent account number. In Bangladesh, the Import Registration Certificate (IRC), generally issued within three business days, is required of any company that imports commercially, and sets a maximum annual value per product.

Our sources did not identify a comparable importer registration number for Pakistan: declarations go through the Pakistan Single Window, an integrated platform that issues licenses, permits and certificates online. Verify with the Federal Board of Revenue before a first transaction.

India stands apart from the other two markets through the activity of its Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR), which regularly investigates antidumping cases against China. As of September 27, 2026, its page of ongoing investigations lists, among cases against China, webbing fabric, organophosphonates, PCB tools, wallpaper, elevator guide rails, 6-aminopenicillanic acid, semi-finished ophthalmic lenses, hot-rolled stainless steel, and nylon 6 granules, a non-exhaustive list updated on an ongoing basis.

These are ongoing investigations, not necessarily final duties: the exact status and the rate applicable to a given manufacturer must be checked on the DGTR website before signing with a factory in any of these categories. We found no comparable mechanism for Pakistan or Bangladesh: India's system remains the most active in the region against China.

From southern China, India clears most of its freight through Nhava Sheva, which handles about half the combined container traffic of India's major ports, and through Mundra, with 7.5 million TEU across four terminals. In Pakistan, Port Qasim, near Karachi, operates 18 berths for an annual capacity of 89 million tonnes and claims over 52% of the country's imports and exports; Gwadar remains geared toward regional CPEC transshipment. In Bangladesh, the port of Chittagong (Chattogram) handles over 90% of the country's international trade according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, a gateway to plan out with your freight forwarder.

No source gives a specific transit time to these destinations: ask your freight forwarder when booking. FOB from southern China suits a buyer who arranges their own transport, CIF or CFR when an intermediary handles it through to the port, with DDP still not recommended as long as the Chinese seller is not a registered customs declarant on the ground. On payment, the norm remains a deposit followed by a balance before shipment, paid to the Chinese company's business account, never a personal account; in Bangladesh, the letter of credit is also among the documents required to clear customs. Any change of bank details received by email should be verified by a direct phone call.

The best-documented niches remain, in India, consumer electronics and chemical or plastic inputs; in Pakistan, CPEC-related equipment and textile machinery; in Bangladesh, garment machinery and raw cotton, driven by a ready-to-wear sector worth tens of billions of dollars. An electronic product bound for India should be scoped against its BIS certification before ordering, a chemical or metallurgical product against the DGTR list, and a textile product bound for Pakistan or Bangladesh against the PSQCA or BDS list.

A first order follows a stable sequence: specifications, factory verification, an approved sample, a proforma invoice with an incoterm, a check on certification and, for India, on any antidumping measure, production monitoring, pre-shipment inspection, freight to the port, then customs clearance by the local importer, never by the Chinese seller.

Sorva is a sourcing and trading house between China and the world, based in Guangzhou, backed by a Chinese subsidiary whose corporate purpose covers trading, and by a parent company in France. Our Chinese-speaking team finds and vets factories, arranges visits and samples, negotiates, has quality checked before loading, and arranges freight to the chosen port, while gathering the documents needed for local certification or for the letter of credit opened by the buyer. Sorva is never the official importer in the client's country and does not clear customs locally. Our base offer is invoiced in US dollars outside the EU, complemented by market-specific options, including BIS, PSQCA or BDS support, quoted on request. Contact: WhatsApp +33 6 15 55 62 52, [email protected].