Customs officers deal with problems related to Decree 15 on food safety

	Many new points in the management of food safety
	The Government issue specific regulations on using public properties
	Removing obstacles to transfer enterprises to SCIC

Many provisions in Decree 15 causes difficulty for enterprises. Photo: Thu Hoa.

Mechanism is open but not specific

Immediately after the issuance of Decree 15/2018/NQ-CP (referred to as Decree 15), the General Department of Vietnam Customs shall take the initiative in synthesizing and reporting to the leaders of the Ministry of Finance on the problems related to export and import of goods under the scope of regulation in this Decree.

At the same time, in order to expeditiously solve problems in Decree 15, the Department of Customs Supervision and Management chaired a meeting with the Food Safety Department of the Ministry of Health at the headquarters of General Department of Vietnam Customs. In order to have a legal basis for guiding Customs units to implement Decree No. 15/2018 / ND-CP, representatives of the Food Safety Department of the Ministry of Health shall request the Department of Customs Supervision and Management to sum up all problems and send documents to the specialized agencies so that they can give written comments.

According to the Deputy Head of the Department of Customs Supervision and Management, Mr. Le Nguyen Viet Ha, there are many obstacles that need to be removed so that Customs offices can carry out business procedures in Customs clearance.

For example, with regard to the application of the reduced inspection method, Articles 16, 18 and 19 of Decree 15 provide for a reduced inspection method to a maximum of 5% of total import shipments within one year. Customs officers shall randomly select and conduct examination of dossiers. This rule can not be implemented because in order to determine the quantity of 5% of the total quantity of goods subject to the reduced inspection method, statistics on total import shipments must be made within one year from the date when Decree 15 takes effect.

In addition, Clause 1, Article 18 of Decree 15 does not specifically stipulate that some papers must be original or certified copy for enterprise, 3 results of food certification by the normal inspection method.

For imported food, the State inspection agencies assigned or designated by the specialized managing ministries shall receive the inspection registration dossiers according to the common mode. The Customs office which does not have data information on enterprises or commodities subject to the application of random inspection method, shall select 5% of commodities for inspection; and issue three notifications of food certification to meet import requirements.

Continue to handle problems

The issue of State inspection bodies for imported food is also problematic. Under the provisions of Articles 15, 18, 19, 37, 38 and 39 of Decree 15, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Ministry of Industry and Trade are responsible for assigning or appointing inspection agencies for food safety of imported products. But until now the Customs has not received this list from the ministries. Therefore, Customs clearance officers can not determine which agency is competent to issue notification of the results of certification to meet import requirements according to Form 5, Appendix I, issued together with Decree 15. Therefore, area gencies that have been designated to carry out State inspection of food safety as stipulated in Decree 38/2012 / ND-CP to continue carrying out inspections in accordance with Decree No. 15 or not?

In order to implement the provisions on the reduced inspection method in Decree 15, relevant ministries should assume the prime responsibility for building a database of qualified organizations, individuals and products to apply the reduced inspection method. Pending the database development, the State management agencies of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Industry and Trade shall notify the list of organizations, individuals and products to apply the reduced inspection mode so that the Customs offices can handle the customs clearance procedures according to the provisions of the Customs legislation.

In addition, some regulations on the application of inspection methods decreased; goods subject to state inspection of food safety; and transitional provisions in Decree 15 also cause problems.

The above issues at the dissemination of Decree 15, organized by the Central Institute for Economic Management and Research, Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry and 6 professional associations jointly held on March 6, enterprises reported problems related to the Customs offices' refusal to accept products and raw materials for internal production of organizations or individuals that are not exempt from the procedures for self-declaration of products or exempt from food safety inspection. Regarding this issue, Ms. Ha said: "We have actively researched and recommended the problems of Decree 15, but we just heard about the above mentioned businesses at this conference".

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"In order to promptly handle problems of enterprises, the Customs office will release documents to instruct the local Customs immediately to deal with problems without waiting for documents submitted by enterprises after this conference. For problems beyond their authority, the Ministry of Health (MOH) should guide and remove them soon", Ms. Ha informed.