Czech Republic:
Industry in the heart of Europe

The Czech Republic as a market for South America

The Czech Republic is an industrial country. Machinery, electrical engineering and above all the automotive industry, with Škoda Auto in Mladá Boleslav, shape the economy. For South American suppliers this means that alongside food such as coffee, fruit or wine, there is demand for raw materials, intermediate goods and IT services for industrial customers. Reliable figures on Czech trade with individual South American countries are in Eurostat's foreign trade database (Comext), sorted by commodity code.

Overseas goods enter the country through other countries' ports. The Port of Hamburg describes itself as the most important hub for Czech and Slovak foreign trade; from there, containers travel mostly by rail to Prague and other terminals. For you, this means your container is usually cleared in Germany or another EU seaport, or forwarded under transit. Your importer or freight forwarder decides where the customs declaration is filed.

What is the same across the EU and what applies nationally

Tariffs, rules of origin and product law are uniform throughout the EU. What you need to know is in the guide Exporting to the EU. A CE marking valid in Spain is also valid in the Czech Republic.

Some things that create a lot of day-to-day work do differ by country:

• Language: under § 11 of the Consumer Protection Act (zákon č. 634/1992 Sb.), written information for consumers, including instructions for use and product notices, must be available in Czech. A Slovak or English text is not enough.
• Packaging: whoever places packaged goods on the Czech market has obligations under the Packaging Act (zákon č. 477/2001 Sb., o obalech). Most companies meet them through a contract with the authorized compliance scheme EKO-KOM. Whether you or your importer carries the obligation depends on who first places the goods on the market in the Czech Republic. Since August 12, 2026, the EU Packaging Regulation (EU) 2025/40 applies as well, but registers and fees remain national.
• Taxes: the standard VAT rate is 21 %. The national currency is the Czech koruna (CZK); many industrial customers still invoice in euros.
• Authorities: customs is handled by the Celní správa, market surveillance for consumer products by the Česká obchodní inspekce.

NIS2 in the Czech Republic

The Czech Republic transposed NIS2 with an entirely new law: zákon č. 264/2025 Sb., o kybernetické bezpečnosti (Cybersecurity Act). It was promulgated on August 4, 2025 and has applied since November 1, 2025, replacing the old Act 181/2014 Sb. The competent authority is the Národní úřad pro kybernetickou a informační bezpečnost (NÚKIB), based in Brno. Reports go exclusively through the NÚKIB portal; the national CERT (CSIRT.CZ, run by the CZ.NIC association) also accepts reports from entities with lighter obligations only through this portal.

One peculiarity: the law has no essential and important entities. It regulates services (regulované služby) and divides them into a higher-obligation and a lower-obligation regime. Anyone in scope must register the service with NÚKIB within 60 days. For companies already in scope on November 1, 2025, that deadline ended on December 31, 2025. According to NÚKIB, about 4,800 organizations had registered by early February 2026, out of roughly 6,000 expected.

What does this mean for you as a supplier? Your Czech customer has to manage the security of its supply chain and passes this obligation on by contract. If you provide software, cloud services or remote maintenance for a plant in the Czech Republic, expect questionnaires on access, vulnerabilities and reporting channels. For the vulnerability part, an external check with veyrisk shows what an attacker could see of your systems, and the report can go straight into your answer. Your customer must report incidents early, following the directive's model (early warning within 24 hours), and will ask you for a shorter deadline in the contract.

Data protection and supply chain

The GDPR applies directly. The supervisory authority is the Úřad pro ochranu osobních údajů (ÚOOÚ) in Prague. If you process employee or customer data for a Czech client, you need a data processing agreement under Art. 28 GDPR and, if your country has no adequacy decision, standard contractual clauses.

The Czech Republic has no supply chain law of its own like the German LkSG. Many Czech firms belong to German or French groups, though, and adopt their codes of conduct. At EU level, the obligations of the CSDDD come on top.

What Czech customers typically ask for

TISAX is widespread in the automotive industry, because Škoda belongs to the Volkswagen Group and passes the German manufacturers' requirements down the supply chain. If you deliver engineering services from Córdoba or software from Montevideo to a supplier in Bohemia, sooner or later you will be asked for a TISAX label.

For quality, industrial customers usually expect an ISO 9001 certificate, and in the automotive industry also IATF 16949. For IT service providers, ISO 27001 is the usual proof. Sightadel guides you through building the ISMS and can manage ISO 9001 in the same platform. In food retail, international chains work with the well-known standards such as IFS or BRCGS (food safety).

Contacts

• CzechTrade, the government export agency, has offices in South America, including São Paulo, Bogotá, Santiago de Chile and Lima. It also helps with contacts in the other direction.
• The Czech embassies in the region and the Consulate General in São Paulo have economic sections.
• The Hospodářská komora České republiky (Economic Chamber) and the Enterprise Europe Network, with contact points in the Czech Republic, help you find partners.
• Questions on imports and tariffs go to the Celní správa České republiky.

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