Ho Chi Minh City Customs: Focus on arranging and perfecting the organizational structure model

	Illegal scrap imports will be prosecuted
	Scrap not meeting import standards will be enforced to be re-exported
	Many positive changes in specialized inspections in HCMC

The Deputy Director General Mai Xuan Thanh speaks at the meeting.

The revenues declined sharply

The Deputy Director of HCM City Customs Department, Mr. Le Dinh Loi said that the company deployed many solutions to facilitate and support nearly 39,000 enterprises doing business in the first 6 months of 2018; detected and recorded 621 violation cases with the value of VND 215.5 billion (a decrease of 11.2% in number of violations and an increase of 141.1% in value over the same period in 2017).

However, due to the impact of many factors reducing the revenue collection, till 30 June 2018, State budget revenues of the HCM City Customs Department reached VND 49,560 billion, equal to 45.88% of the estimate (VND 108 trillion), equal to 94.51% of the same period in 2017. This is a big challenge for the Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department in the last months of 2018.

At the conference, one of the contents that the Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department focuses on for the last months of the year is to rearrange the organizational structure in a streamlined, effective operation, to facilitate the import and export activities of enterprises and nurture revenues to complete the task of collecting VND 108 trillion for the State budget.

In addition to the 7 key tasks to be implemented in the last 6 months, the Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department has raised 7 problems and recommendations related to professional work, including: Deployment of automatic Customs clearance system; handling of goods left in stock, especially scraps; obstacles in the implementation of new documents; the operating conditions of the centralized cargo inspection locations, and etc.

Focus on facilitating trade

At the conference, the representatives of the Department of Customs Supervision and Management, the Department of Import-Export Duty and the Department of Customs Information Technology and Statistics under the General Department of Vietnam Customs answered and acknowledged some problems of the HCM City Customs Department related to the implementation of the system of automatic Customs management, the processing of unrealized declarations on the system, the work of tax calculation prices and the examination for imported iron and steel scraps.

Regarding waste left at the ports managed by the HCM City Customs Department, the Head of the Department of Customs Supervision and Management, Mr. Au Anh Tuan said that the General Department of Vietnam Customs had specific instructions, which can reduce the import of scrap materials and speed up the handling of unsold goods at ports. However, after the Tan Cang Saigon stopped receiving scraps at Cat Lai port, the trend of scrap imports to the north is beginning, with a large number of scraps coming to Hai Phong.

Regarding inquiries about sampling time and test results related to the Inspection Department, Mr. Au Anh Tuan said that the General Department of Vietnam Customs directed to speed up the process of sampling and test results, speeding up Customs clearance goods.

Speaking at the meeting, the Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs, Mr. Mai Xuan Thanh commented that the results obtained by the HCM City Customs Department in the past 6 months derived from the great efforts in the context of tariff reduction. Accordingly, the department had many practical programs to support and nourish the revenues; established a number of major projects, combatted many cases of illegal transportation of narcotics, contributing to the overall achievement of the whole sector.

Directing the implementation of tasks in the last 6 months, Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs asked Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department to focus on the most important task,which is to facilitate trade. In particular, the Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department shall comprehensively implement the budget collection solutions, assess factors affecting revenue sources, volume, price and debt collection.

Regarding the screening, in the past, the number of screened containers at the border decreased more than before. The Deputy General Director said the Customs should not reduce the number of screenings, butmaintain the ability to screen the containers for prevention of illegal cases. For the effective screening, the Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department needs to review the flow of goods to improve the efficiency.

As for staff, the HCMC Customs Department is one of the last units in the sector to rearrange the organizational structure of cadres and units to implement effectively according to the leadership of the ministry, leaders of the General Department of Vietnam Customs, in which attention should be paid to young talent.

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Noting the directions of the Deputy Director General of Vietnam Customs Mai Xuan Thanh, the Director of Ho Chi Minh City Customs Department Dinh Ngoc Thang said that the Department would implement many solutions to overcome difficulties and fulfill political task in 2018.