Customs has actively offered many solutions for budget collection and achieved outstanding results. Trade facilitation and anti-trade fraud and anti-revenue loss solutions have brought positive effects.

Customs collects VND31,000 billion on monthly basis

The entire Customs sector collected VND284,600 billion or 90.35% of the estimate, 84.5% of the desired target and 85% of the target assigned by the Ministry of Finance and up 22.45% year-on-year.

Customs received VND31,600 billion per month on average. In August and September alone, the figure was VND28,460 billion and VND24,600 billion respectively, down by 19.8% compared to previous seven months due to impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Imports and Exports surged 25% year-on-year to US$ 485.68 billion. Taxable imports and exports recorded a rise of over 33% year-on-year to US$104.73 billion. Of which imports grew 34.8% to more than US$100 billion and exports grew 9.8% year-on-year to US$4.81 billion.

A Customs officer of Dinh Vu port Customs Branch under Hai Phong
Customs Department inspects imported goods. Photo: T. Binh

Commodities recorded large revenue from the same period last year such as: Iron and steel of all kinds rose 47.95% to US$10.62 billion; machines, equipment and spare parts rose 25.23% to US$20.78 billion; CBU cars of all kinds soared 69% to US$2.51 billion; and auto spare parts grew 34.9% to US$3.28 billion.

In addition, the price of crude oil in the first nine months of the year increased to more than US$65/barrel. Due to the high price of fuel, the prices of other commodities also saw a rise year-on-year.

In particular, the revenue of eight local customs departments: Ho Chi Minh City, Hai Phong, Hanoi, Ba Ria - Vung Tau, Dong Nai, Binh Duong, Bac Ninh and Ha Nam Ninh reached 75% or more of the estimate. In which, customs department recording over 80% of the estimate included Hai Phong, Ba Ria - Vung Tau, Hanoi, Dong Nai, and Binh Duong.

Many solutions offered 

To strive to complete the assigned tasks, the General Department of Customs has issued Directive 215/CT-TCHQ on enhancing the efficiency of state budget collection, which indicates groups of common solutions and specific solutions for each unit in the context of the world and regional economy and the complicated spread of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Accordingly, the General Department of Customs has focused on two solutions of trade facilitation and combat against trade fraud and budget revenue-loss.

The General Department of Customs advised development and submitted to the Ministry of Finance to submit to the Government for promulgation Decree 18/2021/ND-CP amending and supplementing a number of articles of Decree 134/2016/ND-CP detailing a number of articles and measures to implement the Law on Import and Export Duties.

This includes specific and transparent provisions which have contributed to reforming administrative procedures in the direction of expanding IT application, improving the business environment and national competitiveness, removing difficulties for production and business activities of enterprises; contributed to attracting foreign investment, developing export production and economic growth; and created more favourable conditions for the tax management and collection by the Customs.

The Customs authority also advised the Ministry of Finance to issue Dispatch 10947/BTC-TCHQ dated September 22, 2021 guiding local customs departments to implement Resolution 106/NQ-CP on tax policies applicable to goods imported for use as aid for the prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Accordingly, goods imported by Vietnamese organizations and individuals to be provided as aid to the Government, the Ministry of Health, provincial-level People's Committees and Vietnam Fatherland Front Committees to serve the prevention and control of the Covid-19 pandemic, shall be subject to import duty and value-added tax policies applicable to goods imported for use as humanitarian aid and non-refundable aid.

In particular, the Customs sector has expanded electronic tax payment with 44 banks to create favorable conditions for enterprises in tax payment.

In parallel with creating favorable conditions for businesses, in order to improve the effectiveness of state management, and prevent revenue loss in the implementation of the 2021 budget collection task, the General Department of Customs has also implemented a number of solutions and brought many significant results.

In particular, to prevent fraud in VAT refund, the General Department of Customs issued Official Dispatch 4539 dated September 21, 2021 to request local customs departments to strengthen collecting information, identifying signs of risk to take appropriate inspection and supervision measures.

In addition, the Customs authority has actively developed, amended and supplemented legal documents and implemented the single window mechanism to further shorten the processing time of administrative procedures for enterprises and taxpayers.