The simplified regime of Decreto N° 137/026 allows the definitive import of inputs, machines and equipment exempt from payment of every tax and para-tax, including value added tax and the specific internal tax, where they are destined for the process of testing or development linked to turning scientific knowledge into products that improve human, animal or environmental health. It was enacted on 16 June 2026 and published on 8 July 2026 (primary source: IMPO, Decreto N° 137/026, Article 1, as of 22 August 2026).
This material follows the decree article by article and in the order a company passes through them. Article 211 of Ley N° 20.446, which gives it its basis, is described as the decree itself sets it out, because the text of that article in the law was not read separately in this check.
First step: proving the size and the line of business
Access is not requested at customs. Article 4 requires proof, through the National Directorate for Crafts and Small and Medium Enterprises of the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Mining, of being the holder of a micro, small or medium enterprise whose activity covers the scientific and technological line of business. Two conditions sit in one sentence: size and line of business, and neither substitutes for the other.
Qualification as a micro, small or medium enterprise is not declared: it is proven before that body, which is the same one that administers the register of enterprises of that size. And the scientific and technological line of business has to be covered by the company’s activity, not by the particular project for which the import is made, so a company whose main object is something else does not enter the regime even where the imported equipment does go to a scientific development.
Second step: the endorsement of the National Research and Innovation Agency
The same Article 4 adds a second gate: holding the endorsement of the National Research and Innovation Agency, and that the goods imported under the regime have as their exclusive destination their use in the process of testing or development linked to turning scientific knowledge into products intended to improve human, animal or environmental health.
The endorsement does not stay in a file. Under Article 5 the Agency communicates to the National Customs Directorate the list of subjects covered to operate in the regime, and also the list of those suspended or removed, stating the period. The authorisation is therefore a live list customs receives, not a certificate the company presents.
The word that orders the rest is «exclusive». The exemption rests on the destination of the goods, so a single piece of equipment bought for the testing process and also for ordinary production does not fit the wording of Article 4.
Third step: being up to date before importing
Article 6 adds requirements that do not depend on science but on tax standing. Those interested must be entered in the Single Tax Register of the tax authority and prove that they are up to date with their tax obligations before the tax authority and the social security bank.
Article 7 closes the circuit on the documentary side: the importer or the customs broker must obtain the permits, certificates, licences and other authorisations, documents and information corresponding to the type of input. The regime simplifies the customs procedure and the tax burden, but it does not relieve anyone of the controls proper to each type of goods: an input requiring a sanitary authorisation still requires it, and the exemption neither alters that requirement nor shortens that procedure.
The cap counted by calendar year
Article 3 fixes the limit in a single figure and surrounds it with three qualifications that are worth reading together, because they change the result depending on how purchases are organised across the year. The table separates them as the article writes them.
| Element of Article 3 | How it is written |
|---|---|
| Maximum annual amount | 1 000 000 US dollars for all customs operations under the regime |
| Basis of measurement | Invoice value |
| Unit it applies to | Per importer, whether a natural or a legal person |
| Period | The calendar year as the reference |
The cap is per importer and not per project, so two different research lines inside the same company share the same million. And because the period is the calendar year, a large purchase in December and another in January fall in different years even where they belong to the same development (primary source: IMPO, Decreto N° 137/026, Article 3, as of 22 August 2026).
What still has to happen at customs
The regime is created, but the procedure through which it is exercised was not yet available at the time of this check. Article 2 provides that the National Customs Directorate will put in place, by electronic means, a simplified customs clearance within a period of 90 days counted from the entry into force of the decree, in accordance with Article 211 of Ley N° 20.446 and Article 68 of Ley N° 19.276, the Customs Code.
The decree prints no separate date of entry into force. Taking the date of publication as the reference, which is the later of the two the record shows, the 90 days would expire on 6 October 2026; if entry into force occurred earlier, the period expires earlier. This calculation is an own operation and is presented as such, not as a fact from the rule (primary source: IMPO, Decreto N° 137/026, Article 2, as of 22 August 2026).
Quality of the sources and what remains unresolved
All of the above comes from the text of Decreto N° 137/026 published by IMPO and checked on 22 August 2026. No consultancy, no customs broker and no press item was consulted, and no figure comes from any other source.
Three things remain unresolved and are named so that nobody fills them in by analogy. The exact date of entry into force of the decree does not appear separately in the record, hence the caveat about the 90-day period. The procedure by which the National Research and Innovation Agency grants, suspends or withdraws the endorsement is not in the decree and was not verified separately. And no public list of authorised subjects was located, so this material does not state how many companies operate in the regime.
Dates of the regime
The dates below come from the decree and its record, and are ordered by when they matter for a company assessing entry into the regime. The last one is an own calculation, and it is identified as such in the list.
- 16 June 2026 — enactment of Decreto N° 137/026.
- 8 July 2026 — publication of the decree.
- 90 days from entry into force — the period in Article 2 for customs to put the simplified clearance in place.
- 6 October 2026 — expiry of that period counted from publication, an own calculation.
- Calendar year — the reference period of the 1 000 000 US dollars cap per importer.
Fuentes
The only source is the text of Decreto N° 137/026 published by IMPO, the Uruguayan official database, read on 22 August 2026 in the version marked as an updated document. The references to Article 211 of Ley N° 20.446 and to Article 68 of Ley N° 19.276, the Customs Code, come from that same text and are described here as the decree sets them out, not quoted from the statutes themselves. The calculation of the 90 days from publication is an own operation on a date the record prints.
What does not add up is said without decoration: the record prints no date of entry into force distinct from enactment and publication, so the starting point of the period in Article 2 is not unequivocal, and that is flagged in the text. Neither the endorsement procedure of the National Research and Innovation Agency nor the existence of a public list of authorised subjects was verified, and for that reason no number of companies and no selection criterion the decree does not state is mentioned (primary source: IMPO, Decreto N° 137/026, Articles 4 to 7, as of 22 August 2026).
General analysis of rules in force. It does not constitute legal, tax, immigration or financial advice.
