VCN – In early 2021, the Prime Minister issued Decision 38 approving “the scheme on reforming the model of quality inspection and food safety inspection for imports” to facilitate customs procedures and reduce time and cost for businesses; protect legitimate rights and interests of businesses and consumers, improve the efficiency of quality management and food safety inspection for imports.
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| Customs officers of Thanh Thuy International Border Gate Customs Branch implement a physical inspection for goods. |
This is a solution that aims to reform specialized inspection procedures for imports and remove obstacles under Resolution 19, Resolution 99, Resolution 99 and Resolution 02 in 2019 and 2020. The Government assigned the Ministry of Finance to develop the scheme on reforming specialized inspection in the direction that Customs is the leading agency in specialized inspection at border gates and the specialized management ministries perform post-inspection.
The implementation of solutions in the new resolutions meets requirements of comprehensive reform to improve efficiency of specialized inspection procedures. The scheme is developed to achieve the goal.
The reform of inspection methods is expected to help businesses reduce cost and contacts between the businesses and agencies, and not participate in the quality inspection and food safety inspection for imports.
The new model will also help the Government to reduce costs for specialized agencies and shorten customs clearance time; raise awareness of businesses in complying with the law.
The development of draft decree is a key task. Therefore, the Prime Minister assigned the Ministry of Finance to develop this model.
Currently, the draft decree specifies seven reform contents in Decision 38, including concretizing the focal role of the customs in quality inspection and food safety inspection for imports; applying three inspection methods for quality and food safety inspections to reduce the number of import consignments subject to inspection; simplifying procedures for quality and food safety inspections for imports; inspecting products to reduce the number of import consignments subject to inspection; applying the risk management in the inspections to ensure the role of state management and improve the compliance of enterprises; expanding entities exempt from the inspections; and applying information technology to launch the new model.
According to assessment from the USAID-funded Trade Facilitation Project, the decree will make a positive impact on businesses and the economy. It is estimated that it will save nearly VND1,376 billion per year (approximately US$59.1 million) for businesses and VND9,285 billion (approximately US$399 million) for the economy.
Head of Customs and Trade Facilitation Department, Vietnam Logistics Business Association (VLA) Tran Viet Huy: The draft decree implements positive reform and is appreciated by businesses First, the draft decree has a new approach, affecting many administrative procedures performed by ministries and government agencies. Many documents on specialized management stipulated that the time for carrying out the procedures takes from two to three days, but if the procedures have not yet been completed, the business must wait. However, the draft decree provides that the system only allows businesses to complete procedures for a certain time. The system will automatically confirm the completion of the inspection if there is no response. This is a breakthrough of the decree. Second, the draft decree provides IT application in management. The regulations in the Decree are developed based on Industry 4.0. The information is publicized and shared on the system for importers to search and carry out procedures. The inspection is linked and connected between state management agencies. Therefore, this is also a tool for management agencies to supervise the inspection. Third, the Decree stipulates that the inspection is implemented by product rather than the importer. This will reduce time for carrying out administrative procedures for the state agencies and businesses, and saving social resources. Fourth, the draft decree also stipulates the risk management is applied in inspection and classifies between compliant enterprises and high-risk enterprises. Previously, the risk management is only applied to food safety inspection. Currently, it is applied to goods quality control. 92% of those surveyed by the VCCI were in agreement on the draft decree. According to the assessment of the USAID-funded Trade Facilitation Project, the application of new model will save US$399 million for the economy per year. |
By Ngoc Linh/Ngoc Loan