One of the important directions of the Director General of Customs Nguyen Van Can at the meeting to evaluate performance in July and deploy tasks in August is strict control of goods for temporary import for re-export, storage in bonded-warehouses and independent transportation in accordance with the Government’s guidelines.

The meeting. Photo: T. Binh 

Consistent in "dual goals"

On the afternoon of August 4, the General Department of Customs held a meeting to evaluate the performance in July and deploy tasks in August. General Director Nguyen Van Can chaired the meeting.

Speaking to guide the implementation of the tasks in August and in the near future, the Director General requested the whole sector to seriously and effectively follow the instructions of Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung at the online meeting to review the performance in July and deploy the tasks in August of the Ministry of Finance (August 4).

He also emphasized key tasks.

First, the whole sector needs to continue to grasp and effectively carry out two tasks at the same time: trade facilitation and improvement of the efficiency of state management on customs; and anti-smuggling.

Determining the implementation of both tasks at the same time as a major challenge, the General Director suggested that each customs officer must try and make more efforts in carrying out their assigned duties and tasks.

“Customs officers are forbidden to allege trade facilitation as a reason for infringing shipments or to take advantage of control and combat against smuggling to intentionally make difficulties for legitimate enterprises. Those who intentionally violate will be strictly punished,”Director General Nguyen Van Can said.

On the other hand, in the context that Vietnam is facing the re-appearance of the Covid-19 pandemic with complicated developments, the Director General requested the whole sector to continue effectively implementing solutions to support enterprises to contribute to successfully meeting the budget collection task.

For the development of legal documents, it is necessary to continue urgently completing them as scheduled. The process of developing legal documents needs to focus more on feasibility in practice, cover each management subject and not make general provisions.

Regarding anti-smuggling, the activities of smuggling, trade fraud and drug crimes have had very complicated developments, therefore, customs units have to intensify information collection, forecasts and make effective plans and measures.

In particular, it is necessary to continue strengthening the strict management of goods for temporary import for re-export, storage in bonded warehouses, independent transportation and trans-shipment in accordance with the Prime Minister’s direction.

Regarding the implementation of the IT system redesign, the Director General instructed the Customs IT and Statistics Department to actively work with relevant agencies in the sector and under the Ministry of Finance to urgently complete the dossier to submit to the Ministry of Finance’s leaders for approval in August to soon carry outrelated tasks.

For the prevention and control of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Director General instructed the whole sector to strictly implement prevention and control measures under the directions of the Government, the Prime Minister and competent agencies.

Exhibits in the seizure of 120kg of drugs on July 30. Photo: Le Thu

Crude oil, Covid-19 pullsbudget revenue down

From the beginning of the year to the end of July, the budget revenue reached VND174.603

Regarding results in July, the total customs revenue reached VND25,039 billion.billion or 51.7% of the estimate, 49.2% of the target, down 16.7% compared to the same period in2019.

According to the General Department of Customs, main reasons for the fall include: at the time of estimating, the price of crude oil was forecast to reach US$60 / barrel, however, in the first six months, the price of crude oil fell below US$35 /barrel.

The Covid-19 pandemic limitedtrade activities, the demand for goods decreased, greatly affecting import-export activities.

Regarding anti-smuggling, after the Government relaxed social distancing and implemented measures to stimulate economic development, allowed the re-opening of sub-border gates of the Vietnam-China land border, the situation of illicit trade and transportation of goods across borders have increased.

In July, the Customs sector chaired, coordinated to discover, arrest and handle 1,081 infringing cases with total infringing goods of VND111,884 billion; contributed to the State budget revenue of VND67,118 billion.

In which, the Customs prosecuted four cases and transferred 10 cases to other agencies for prosecution.

Worryingly, the illicit trade and transportation of narcotics was a problem and tended to increase compared to the previous month.Major infringing goods include sugar, cigarettes, beer, milk powder, western medicines, cosmetics, electronics, poultry, poultry products, animal horns, etc.

Especially, the postal service via air has detected many big cases of drug transportation cases, while in border areas such as Dien Bien, Nghe An and Tay Ninh provinces, illegal cross-border transportation of drugs to Vietnam is still very common with sophisticated tricks and large volumes of seized drugs.

Typically, on the night of July 30, the police, customs, and border forces arrested 16 offenders and seized 120kg of methamphetamine, ketamine and ecstasy; and 19 heroin bricks from the transnational drug trafficking line from Cambodia through the Southwest border gate areas to Ho Chi Minh City for consumption, managed by Chinese and Korean citizens.