The legal basis for international air travel was laid down in the 96 articles drawn up by the International Civil Aviation Organisation at the Chicago Convention of 1944. This Convention, agreed by fifty-four nations, extended the duty-free status of ships in international waters to include aircraft on international flights. The Convention also provided for the creation of ‘Customs free’ airports to service these airports. The first such airport opened in Shannon in 1947, facilitating the opening of the world’s first airport duty-free shop.

The concept of ‘allowances’ dates from the 1954 New York Convention on International Travel (Convention Concerning Customs Facilities for Touring) agreed by 84 nations, which introduced several measures to facilitate the flow of travellers across international boundaries. It first established the principle that Contracting States shall admit free of import duties and import taxes, articles imported by a tourist for his personal use. Article 3 stipulated the quantities of tobacco products, wines and spirits, perfume and toilet water that could be carried by a tourist, the standard allowance still accepted today (except for wines and spirits which was originally set at one bottle of wine and one quarter litre of spirits).

The World Customs Organisation further addressed the facilitation of customs arrangements for travellers in its International Convention on the Simplification and harmonisation of Customs Procedures, concluded in Kyoto on 18 May 1973. Annex f3 of this Convention establishes the standard practice for the minimum limits for the quantities of perfume, wine, spirits and tobacco goods allowed to be imported free of import duties and taxes by travellers.

This should be not less than:

• 200 cigarettes or 50 cigars or 250 grams of tobacco, or an assortment of these products of a total weight not exceeding 250 grams
• 2 litres of wine or 1 litre of spirits
• quarter litre of toilet water and 50 grams of perfume

Revisions to this Convention, considered necessary to take account of customs developments since 1973, were finalised in Brussels in June 1999 and the new Annex J deals with arrangements for travellers. The quantitative limits remain the same but the Convention text refers to “recommended” practice rather than “standard” practice as in the previous Conventions. This revised Convention has yet to come into force as the required number of Contracting Parties has yet to be realised.