Customs procedures are
always a haunting torment of many companies and businesses. Recently, the Prime
Minister has ordered Vietnam Ministry of Finance, the General Department of
Customs to review the administrative procedures and plan for reducing,
amending of the unnecessary procedures that hindering and harassing
businesses, to make investment in Vietnam more competitive and the legal
environment in Vietnam more transparent.
Pursuant to the
announcement No. 289/TB-VPCP dated 25th July 2014 on management and reform
of administrative procedures in Customs decision of the Vietnam Ministry of
Finance, 12 administrative procedures in the customs sector have
been discarded, reduced down to 164 types.
Before that, the time
consumed for the export procedures in Vietnam was 4 days, as twice as
the average time consumed in the region and was one of the highest figures
in the region. The time consumed for the import procedures is 4 days, compared
to the average of 3 days of the region. The time for the preparation
of documents for import-export is 12 days, 1 day longer than the average
numbers. Meanwhile, companies have to complete 13 documents for
procedures, higher than Singapore, which requirs 6 types of documents and
Malaysia with the respective number of 8.
In accordance
with the annoucement, the Prime Minister demands the focus on
renovating administration of Vietnam Tax, Customs procedures that target by the
end of 2014, the time consumed by conducting these import-export,
clearance of products procedures shall be cut in half; and to reduce the
number of documents required; publicly announce the statistics of the customs
operation; and finally, in 2015, reduce the number of hours consumed
for the custom procedures of export-import products into Vietnam equal to the
average figures of ASEAN-6 nation, which is 171 hours annually.
