Four authorities issue export licences in Belgium; the work’s location decides which.

Four Belgian authorities can issue an EU export licence for a work of art: three Community administrations and the federal FPS Economy. The Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region are not among them. Which one to use depends on where the work is lawfully and definitively located.

Published by ArtisDomus, written by Polina Surina.

Each Member State gives the European Commission a list of the authorities that can issue export licences for cultural goods. The Commission publishes it in the C series of the Official Journal (art. 3, Council Regulation (EC) No 116/2009). The list of 23 January 2026 names four Belgian authorities.

Three are the Communities: the Flemish Community’s Departement Cultuur, Jeugd en Media, the Ministère de la Communauté française, Direction du Patrimoine culturel, and the Ministerium der Deutschsprachigen Gemeinschaft in Eupen. The fourth is the Service des Licences of the federal FPS Economy. The owner’s address and the shipper’s make no difference to which one applies.

Exporting cultural goods outside the customs territory of the Community requires an export licence (art. 2(1), Regulation (EC) No 116/2009). Cultural goods are the items listed in Annex I (art. 1). An item outside Annex I is not a cultural good under the Regulation, whatever it is worth.

Annex I lists fifteen categories, and Part B sets a value threshold for most of them. Archaeological objects, dismembered elements of monuments, incunabula and manuscripts, and archives need a licence whatever their value. The threshold is €15 000 for mosaics, drawings, engravings, photographs and printed maps, and €30 000 for watercolours, gouaches and pastels. It is €50 000 for statuary, books, collections, means of transport and any other antique item. For pictures and paintings it is €150 000.

The age rule does most of the work, and it sits in a footnote. Footnote 1 to Annex I limits categories 3 to 9 to items more than 50 years old that do not belong to their originators. So a painting bought from the artist last season is not a cultural good under the Regulation, at any price. A brand moving a recent commission is outside it entirely.

Annex I also fixes when value is tested: when the export licence application is submitted. The value that counts is the object’s value in the Member State referred to in Article 2(2).

Article 2(4) covers the other side, and it is why national law always matters too. National treasures of artistic, historic or archaeological value may fall outside the Regulation’s cultural goods. Their direct export from the customs territory of the Community is then governed by the national law of the Member State of export. So the Regulation sets a minimum, and national law can go further.

The Brussels-Capital Region has been competent for movable cultural heritage on its territory since 1 July 2014, under the Sixth State Reform. It legislated in the Ordinance of 25 April 2019 on the movable and intangible cultural heritage of the Brussels-Capital Region. The Ordinance was published in the Moniteur belge of 17 May 2019. Its provisions that need no implementing orders have been in force since 1 July 2019.

The ordinance is clear about the licence. Under Article 22(1), any application to export a cultural good other than a treasure needs the Government’s authorisation, following the procedures of Regulation (EC) No 116/2009. Under Article 22(3), the Government has thirty days from receipt of a complete and admissible application. It can extend this once by thirty days if it considers a fuller examination necessary.

Article 22(4) allows a suspension of at most one month after that period, if the Government considers the good meets the classification criteria in article 11(1). Under Article 22(5), a decision during the suspension to pre-empt or to open a classification procedure counts as a refusal. Article 22(6) covers the end of the suspension. If by then the Government has neither notified an intention to pre-empt nor opened a classification procedure, the authorisation is granted automatically.

Article 21 covers a classified treasure separately. Taking one out of the Region, temporarily or for good, without the Government’s authorisation is forbidden. The Government has two months from a complete application, and if no authorisation is given in that time, it counts as a refusal. Conditions may be imposed to protect the object or the interest that justified its classification. They may cover conservation, methods of display, transport and public access. A temporary authorisation sets the period within which the treasure must return to the Brussels-Capital Region.

The Region’s heritage administration says the Region can issue export licences under Regulation (EC) No 116/2009 for cultural goods on its territory leaving the European Union. It adds that the Region is competent for treasures leaving the Region.

The EU list does not name the Region. The Official Journal list of 23 January 2026 names the two large Communities, the German-speaking Community and the FPS Economy. The Flemish administration’s note explains the arrangement behind that. The federal authority is competent for movable cultural goods in Brussels. Since the Sixth State Reform, the Brussels-Capital Region is competent for bicultural matters of regional interest.

The note says these cover goods on the Region’s territory that are privately held or belong to non-federal bicultural institutions, and that are also of particular interest to the Region. The federal and Brussels authorities agreed that from 1 January 2026 the federal authority would act, for the time being, as the first point of contact for applications.

Under that arrangement, the Flemish and French Community services were to stop taking Brussels applications after 10 December. Applications for goods in Brussels go to a functional mailbox at the FPS Economy, which checks admissibility and then processes them.

So an owner in Brussels applies to the federal authority, although the Region’s ordinance says the Region grants the authorisation.

The Flemish law is the decree of 24 January 2003 protecting movable cultural heritage of exceptional importance, known as the Topstukkendecreet. Under Article 2bis, a topstuk is a movable good or collection that must be regarded as rare and indispensable. That judgement rests on its archaeological, historical, cultural-historical, artistic or scientific significance for the Flemish Community.

Rare means that few others, the same or similar and in the same condition, exist within the Flemish Community. Indispensable means the good has at least one of four properties. It may have a particular value for the collective memory. It may be a link in a development important to the evolution of art, cultural history, archaeology, history or science. It may be a benchmark for studying other important objects. Or it may have particular artistic value measured against known artistic production.

Article 11(1) sets the ban: a topstuk may not leave the Flemish Community without the Flemish Government’s permission. Under Article 11(4), the Government has two months from an admissible and valid application. It may set conditions, but they may never amount in effect to a ban. Under Article 11(5), it may refuse if it considers the topstuk must stay in the Flemish Community for its significance. Under Article 11(6), a refusal puts the topstuk on the list automatically, as a provisional measure, if it was not listed already. So a refusal is also a listing.

Article 11bis covers the EU licence. The Flemish Government grants the licence under Regulation (EC) No 116/2009 for a cultural good in the Flemish Community leaving the customs territory of the European Community. It does so within fifteen days of receiving an admissible application. It may extend this once by twenty days if it considers a fuller examination necessary.

Article 11bis(4) links the two procedures. A licence under the Regulation may be granted for a good that is also a topstuk only if the article 11 permission has been obtained first. And if the Government considers the good may be a topstuk, it suspends the licence application for at most two months.

After a refusal, the permission turns into a negotiated sale. Under article 12, the applicant may ask the Flemish Government, by registered letter, to make an offer itself or to have a third party it names make one. The request must come within one month of receiving the refusal. Under article 13, negotiations open within one month of that request. Under article 16, the offer must be notified within ten months of the request. Where a college of experts has fixed the price, the offer is made at that price.

Article 17 lets the Government extend that period by at most four months. It may do so if there are serious signs that an offer at the fixed price can still be made in that time. If no offer at the fixed price is made, or the Government expressly declines to make one, the topstuk gets permission to leave the Flemish Community within fifteen days.

Two more rules apply even when the work stays where it is. Under Article 9(1), the owner, possessor or holder needs the Flemish Government’s permission before any physical intervention on a protected object, after the Council has been heard. The Government may forbid the intervention if it would conflict with the protection rules or cause the object irreparable damage. Article 10 caps the Flemish Community’s conservation and restoration subsidy at 80 per cent of the eligible costs.

The Flemish administration’s procedure gives the timings a shipper works to. The applicant learns within fifteen days of the paper application whether it is admissible. If it is, the licence follows within fifteen days of submission, extendable once by twenty days. The file must include a provenance document giving the origin and ownership history in date order. It must go back at least to 1993, when the EU regulation came into force.

The file also needs the current owner’s proof of title and any EU export licences granted in the past. It needs the permission of any Member State to take the good outside its national territory, and a CITES certificate where the object falls under that convention.

The French Community’s law is the decree of 17 March 2022 on the protection of movable cultural heritage. Under Article 1(1), a movable cultural good is any movable good lawfully and durably located in the French Community. It must fall in one of the categories in Annex 1, section A, of Regulation (EC) No 116/2009.

Article 1(2) says what “in the French Community” means. It means in the French language region. It also means in an institution in the bilingual region of Brussels-Capital that, because of its activities, must be regarded as belonging exclusively to the French Community. That second part is why a Brussels institution can fall within a Community.

Article 3 allows the classification of movable cultural goods of exceptional interest to the French Community for their artistic, historical, archaeological, ethnological or scientific value. Goods classified under it are national treasures within the meaning of Article 36 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

Article 4 requires at least two of six criteria. They are a remarkable state of conservation, rarity, and a link with history or art history. They also include high quality of design and execution, and recognition by a community as an expression of its historical or cultural identity. The sixth is the interest of the whole or the collection the good belongs to.

Article 5 is the key restriction for anyone moving or lending. A classified treasure may not be moved, transformed or destroyed, restored or given conservation treatment without the Government’s prior authorisation. The decree lists what conditions attached to that authorisation may cover. They include the duration of the move, transport conditions including packing, and insurance during the move. They also include conservation conditions at the temporary exhibition venue, the qualifications of the person working on the good, and steps to document the good before its destruction.

Article 6 puts display itself under supervision. The Government controls the state and conditions of conservation of classified treasures. That control expressly covers temperature and humidity, exposure to light, security devices against damage or theft, storage, packing, and how the good is exhibited, moved or used. The Government may impose particular conservation measures. It may also visit the site after giving notice to the owner and, where relevant, the holder.

Article 20(1) gives the licence power. The Government may issue, under a procedure it sets, the export authorisations provided for by Regulation (EC) No 116/2009. It may also issue a certificate, valid for a period it fixes, confirming that a particular movable cultural good is not protected by the French Community. Article 21 is short and absolute: removing a classified treasure permanently from the French Community is prohibited.

The penalties are just as precise. Article 25 covers two offences linked to the export authorisation under article 20(1). One is knowingly making incorrect or incomplete declarations, or giving incorrect or incomplete information, when applying. The other is taking, or causing someone to take, a movable cultural good out of the French Community and outside the European Union without that authorisation. Either is punishable by four months to five years in prison and a fine of €26 to €50 000, or by one of those penalties only.

Under article 23(2), anyone who carries out, causes or helps with the removal of a treasure from the French Community in breach of the decree is also liable. The penalty is four months to five years in prison and a fine of €300 to €100 000, or one of those penalties only. The penalties double for anyone who habitually trades in movable cultural goods or acts as an intermediary in them. They also double for anyone who habitually practises a profession linked to their management or conservation. So the trade is punished at twice the rate of the owner.

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 1081/2012 of 9 November 2012 sets out the forms. It creates three types of export licence: the standard licence, the specific open licence and the general open licence (art. 1(1)). A standard licence is normally used for each export (art. 2(1)). Each Member State decides whether it wishes to issue open licences at all.

An export licence is valid for no more than twelve months from the date of issue (art. 9(1)). For a temporary export, the authorities may set the date by which the goods must be reimported into the issuing Member State (art. 9(2)). If a licence expires unused, the holder must return the sheets immediately (art. 9(3)).

Article 10 covers the specific open licence. It may be issued for a specific cultural good likely to be exported from the Union temporarily and regularly, for use or exhibition in a third country. The good must be owned by, or in the legitimate possession of, the person or organisation that uses or exhibits it.

It may be issued only if the authorities are satisfied that this person or organisation offers every guarantee that the good will come back in good condition. They must also be satisfied that the good can be described or marked so that there is no doubt about it at the moment of temporary export. Article 10(3) caps the licence at five years.

Article 13 covers the general open licence. It may be issued to museums or other institutions for the temporary export of goods in their permanent collection. It may be used for any combination of those goods on any one occasion, and for a series of different combinations. Under article 13(3) it is also capped at five years.

Article 6(2) sets what an application must include. It needs documents on the object and its legal status at the time of the application, such as invoices or expert appraisals. It also needs a duly authenticated photograph, or photographs in black and white or colour of at least 8 cm by 12 cm. The authorities may accept a detailed list in place of the photographs, at their discretion. They may also require the goods to be presented physically (art. 6(3)). The applicant pays for both (art. 6(4)).

Two provisions decide where the licence is used. The export licence is valid throughout the Community (art. 2(3), Regulation 116/2009). It must be presented with the export declaration during the customs export formalities, at the customs office competent to accept that declaration (art. 4). So a licence issued in Belgium is used at whichever external border the shipment leaves by.

One practical limit belongs in any loan agreement. For a temporary export, the Flemish administration enters in box 2 of the standard licence the date by which the goods must be back in Belgium. That date can be at most five years after the temporary export licence is granted.

A work leaving Belgium runs into trouble in one of four places, all of them before the customs desk.

The same pattern runs through all four. The EU licence is about a shipment. The Belgian rules are about the object, and they apply whether or not it is going anywhere. A brand that plans the shipment first and learns the object rules later has already lost time. The Flemish buy-out procedure, or a classification procedure in Brussels, can add months to a date fixed for an opening.