Korea’s imports of luxury goods from the European Union have surged since the implementation of a bilateral free trade deal a year earlier, customs data showed Thursday.

Korea imported a total of $1.24 billion worth of wrist watches, bags, shoes, perfumes and cosmetic products from the EU between July 1, 2011, and June 30 this year, according to the data by the Korea Customs Service.

That amount is up 21.68 percent from $1.02 billion worth of imports of such relatively high-priced products during the same period a year earlier, the data showed. It is also much higher than a 13 percent gain in overall imports from Europe.

The increase is attributable to lowered tariffs since both sides enforced their free trade agreement in July of last year.

Under the deal, tariffs on Europe’s wrist watches were removed, from 8 percent to zero, which resulted in a 126 percent increase in their importation to a value of $8.3 million.

Thanks to similar tariff reductions, imports of bags from Europe also jumped 34 percent to $570 million, while cosmetic products increased 6 percent to $398 million, the data showed.

Shoe and perfume imports from Europe also rose 30 percent and 12 percent, respectively, to values of $182 million and $86 million over the past year. 

(Yonhap News)