EFFORTS TO CONNECT 61 NEW PROCEDURES

In the specialized inspection of imports and exports, as of June 15, 2019, ministries amended and supplemented 84 out of 87 documents, or 97% of the target assigned by the Government, and 10 out of 13 ministries fulfilled 100% of the plan.

That information was released by Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue at a meeting that reviewed performances in the first six months and previewed directions for the last six months of 2019 on implementation of the National Single Window (NSW), the ASEAN Single Window (ASW), specialized inspection reform and trade facilitation held by the Government Office on July 31.

He requested ministries and agencies focus resources to speed up the process of review procedures, develop information technology systems and solutions to deploy 61 new procedures on the NSW in 2019 and complete them in the first quarter of 2020.

By the end of July 2019, ministries and branches successfully connected 16 procedures and they are supposed to connect the other 45 procedures by the end of the year, including 14 procedures of the Ministry of Health, 12 procedures of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and eight procedures of the Ministry of Defense. These three ministries account for 75% of total unconnected procedures.

As of July 10, 2019, the NSW had 174 administrative procedures linked by 13 ministries and branches. It settled over 2.3 million records filed by more than 30,900 businesses. Only in the first six months of 2019, as a standing body of this mechanism, the General Department of Vietnam Customs (Ministry of Finance) coordinated with relevant ministries and branches to build and connect three administrative procedures of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, four procedures of the Ministry of Health, three procedures of the Ministry of Information and Communications and continued to test six procedures of the Ministry of Health and three procedures of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

Notably, some ministries have completed their connections to the NSW. For example, the Ministry of Transport provided 87 administrative procedures, including 75 new procedures in 2018, and completed deploying its administrative procedures on the NSW as per Decision 1254/QD-TTg. The Ministry of Science and Technology has carried out six administrative procedures as per this decision.

On ASW deployment and connection outside ASEAN, Vietnam has now officially exchanged C/O Form D with six countries, namely Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Brunei and Cambodia. As of July 10, 2019, Vietnam received a total of 87,355 C/O from these countries while it sent 153,872 C/O to other countries.

In addition, the General Department of Vietnam Customs (Ministry of Finance) is cooperating with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to prepare technical conditions to exchange ASEAN customs declaration information (with Indonesia and Thailand) and plant quarantine certificates (with Indonesia); join hands with ministries and branches in negotiating the Protocol, unify technical requirements and build a customs declaration and C/O information exchange system with Eurasia Economic Union and negotiating electronic C/O information exchange with South Korea.

Currently, some ministries have authorized/appointed many agencies/organizations to perform specialized inspection of imports and exports. For example, the Ministry of Industry and Trade has designated 14 agencies/organization; the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has assigned 20 agencies/organizations; the Ministry of Health has appointed 12 agencies/organizations to carry out food safety inspections of imported foods within its jurisdiction.

The Ministry of Finance has been assigned to coordinate with other relevant ministries and sectors to develop the Master Plan on Information Technology (IT) to deploy the centrally managed NSW. At the same time, ministries and branches need to shift from the scattered IT system to the focused system to connect with the NSW information technology system. The General Department of Customs has worked with ministries and branches to build a system for evaluating and measuring the operation index of administrative procedures performed on the National Single Window.

Source: VCCI