Guides · SEZ and EPZ
A Special Economic Zone and an Export Processing Zone are not run by the same body.
Shafiq Traders · Updated 14 September 2026
A Special Economic Zone and an Export Processing Zone are two different schemes, run by two different bodies. An SEZ is created under the Special Economic Zones Act, 2012, approved by the Board of Approval — a federal forum chaired by the Prime Minister — with the Board of Investment acting as its secretariat and a provincial SEZ authority handling applications and development at that level. An EPZ is older and separately run: the Export Processing Zones Authority, established in 1980 under its own ordinance and working under the Ministry of Industries and Production, plans, develops and operates zones directly. Goods brought into either kind of zone move under the zone's own exemptions, not an ordinary Goods Declaration for home consumption, and moving anything from the zone into the rest of Pakistan is a fresh import in its own right, assessed at that point rather than carried over from whatever let the goods into the zone.
Two schemes, two different administrators
A Special Economic Zone and an Export Processing Zone get talked about as if they were the same idea with two names. They are not. They run under different laws, are approved and administered by different bodies, and a company inside one does not automatically get whatever a company inside the other gets.
A Special Economic Zone is created under the Special Economic Zones Act, 2012. The Board of Investment acts as secretariat to the Board of Approval — the federal forum, chaired by the Prime Minister, that actually approves a zone — and a provincial SEZ authority handles that zone's applications and development at the provincial level. An Export Processing Zone is older and separately run: the Export Processing Zones Authority, established in 1980 under its own ordinance and working under the Ministry of Industries and Production, plans, develops and operates zones directly, rather than approving zones that somebody else builds and runs.
Two different things, side by side
| Special Economic Zone (SEZ) | Export Processing Zone (EPZ) | |
|---|---|---|
| Legal basis | Special Economic Zones Act, 2012 | Export Processing Zones Authority Ordinance, 1980 |
| Who approves and administers it | Board of Approval, chaired by the Prime Minister, with the Board of Investment as secretariat and a provincial SEZ authority handling applications | Export Processing Zones Authority, under the Ministry of Industries and Production, which plans, develops and runs zones directly |
| Who is inside it | A zone developer and the enterprises it brings in, across whatever sectors the zone's own approval covers | Export-oriented manufacturing enterprises, inside a zone EPZA itself has built and operates |
Importing into a zone is not importing into the tariff area
Goods brought into an SEZ or an EPZ for an enterprise inside it move under that zone's own exemptions, not under a standard Goods Declaration cleared for home consumption. The zone is treated as separate from the rest of the country for that purpose — machinery and inputs come in against the zone enterprise's own approval, not against an ordinary import declaration filed the way a normal consignment is.
What actually changes the picture is moving anything from the zone into the tariff area — the rest of Pakistan, outside the zone. That movement is a fresh import in its own right, assessed and declared as goods leaving the zone for home consumption, not an extension of whatever exemption let them into the zone to begin with. An enterprise that assumes zone status travels with the goods once they leave is assuming something the zone's own rules do not grant.
What actually differs at the file level
A standard import is filed once, against a single Goods Declaration for home consumption, at whichever port or dry port the goods land at. Goods moving into a zone are filed against the zone enterprise's own approval and inventory records, and goods later moving out of the zone into the tariff area need a second, separate filing for that movement — it is not a re-run of the first one, and it is not optional because the goods already cleared into the zone once.
A zone typically runs its own customs formalities, separate from the ports and the dry port an ordinary file moves through. That is worth confirming before assuming the same office handles both ends of the movement.
We clear at Karachi Port, Port Qasim, Karachi airport and Lahore dry port — not inside a zone's own customs station. If your goods are moving into or out of an SEZ or an EPZ itself, ask whoever you are using whether they file at that zone every week, or only occasionally. We would rather tell you where we actually work than take a file at a station we do not know well.
Questions
What importers ask us about SEZs and EPZs
Contact
Tell us what is coming.
Give us the product, the port and roughly when the vessel is due, and we will tell you what the clearance involves and what it will cost.