RP prepared to play by global rules on Customs

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippines is now prepared to play by the global rules on Customs administration.

The accession documents of the Philippines to the Revised Kyoto Convention (RKC) rules on Customs administration were formally turned over to the World Customs Organization (WCO) in ceremonies held in Brussels, Belgium last June 25.

The documents were hand-carried by outgoing Customs Commissioner Napoleon Morales, his executive assistant, Verne Enciso and Collector John Simon, chief of the International Affairs Policy and Planning Department of the Bureau of Customs (BOC).

The RKC is known as the 21st century blueprint for simplified and harmonized system of Customs administration and practices. It was formally adopted by the developed economies that also formulated it in February 2006.

Not a signatory to the original treaty, the Philippines needed to submit its accession documents from the Office of the President that was in turn responsible for endorsing it to the Philippine Senate for ratification.

The advocacy was shepherded for three years by Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago, then chairperson of the foreign relations committee. It was one of the last legislations the 14th Senate approved in February this year before Congress finally adjourned.

In the last meeting with stakeholders prior to the Senate approval, Santiago described the RKC as one of the landmark reform documents the 14th Congress would have passed.

Submission of the accession documents will finally bind the Philippines to the rules which require Philippine Customs to adopt computerization, automation and set up a single window at processing import and export documents as mainstays of a more efficient system of handling imports and exports.

If followed to the letter, the RKC is expected to minimize personal contacts between Customs people and international traders, promote transparency of Customs transactions, speed up the movement of incoming and outgoing goods and curve technical smuggling.

About 71.2 percent of the country’s trade comes from the 59 RKC contracting parties in 2008, with total exports accounting for 83.5 percent and total imports, 60.5 percent. These figures underscores the significant impact of the country’s RKC accession, said Morales in a separate forum.

In the ASEAN region, Vietnam beat the Philippines to be the first to abide by the RKC rules while accession documents of most of the rest of the ASEAN 10 are in different stages of processing.