{"id":20228,"date":"2026-09-17T12:55:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T12:55:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/interspacemusic.com\/blog\/paraguay-private-copy-levy-customs-phones-decree-halved\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T12:55:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T12:55:22","slug":"paraguay-private-copy-levy-customs-phones-decree-halved","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/interspacemusic.com\/blog\/paraguay-private-copy-levy-customs-phones-decree-halved\/","title":{"rendered":"Paraguay Funds Music Royalties With a Customs Levy on Phones. A 2024 Decree Halved It for Shopping Tourism."},"content":{"rendered":"

Paraguay funds a large share of its music royalties with a 0.5 percent levy charged at customs on imported phones, hard drives and memory cards, not with streaming income. The rate is set by presidential decree, and in 2024 it was cut in half to make electronics cheaper for shopping tourists.<\/p>\n

Money reaching a Paraguayan songwriter through the collective system is largely hardware money, and it moves when trade policy moves.<\/p>\n

What the levy is<\/h2>\n

Chapter IV of Ley 1328\/98, Paraguay’s copyright and related rights law, creates a compensation right for private copying. Decreto 4145\/2025 now regulates it, replacing Decreto 4212\/2015.<\/p>\n

DINAPI means Direcci\u00f3n Nacional de Propiedad Intelectual, Paraguay’s national intellectual property office. It administers RISM\u00d3MPP, the register importers and manufacturers of recording and playback equipment must join.<\/p>\n

The charge is 0.5 percent of import value, or of the value of the first domestic sale for goods made in Paraguay. Vouga Abogados set out the mechanics<\/a> when the decree landed in July 2025.<\/p>\n

Diario HOY reported in February 2024 that the levy was raising roughly 12 million dollars a year at customs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The 2024 cut, and what it tells you<\/h2>\n

Decreto 2063, signed on 9 July 2024, halved the private copying tariff in its article 12. The stated purpose was to incentivise shopping tourism for buyers without a Paraguayan domicile, as \u00daltima Hora reported at the time<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The societies said the scheme covers more than 8,000 titleholders. Every one of them took the cut without a vote.<\/p>\n

A year later the government reversed. Decreto 4145\/2025 restored the full rate<\/a> and dropped DINAPI’s own share of net collections from 20 percent to 10 percent.<\/p>\n

Plan for that volatility. An income line set by executive decree, on an instrument that doubles as a trade lever, can be halved between quarters.<\/p>\n

Where the money actually goes<\/h2>\n