WTO’s TFA to accelerate enhanced PH customs efficiency—DTI 

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ID-10034371The ratification of the World Trade Organization’s Trade Facilitation Agreement (WTO TFA) will fast track customs processing in the Philippines, leading to a host of benefits, including an improved local business climate and a wider reach for Philippine products and services internationally, while encouraging small firms to go global, according to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

“The TFA enables streamlined, transparent, and efficient customs procedures which would result to a more conducive trading environment for business, and reduce prices for consumers and producers,” DTI ad-interim secretary Adrian Cristobal, Jr. said in a statement.

“The procedures and provisions in the TFA establish a more efficient and streamlined mechanism for traders which in turn (contributes) to improving the overall experience of doing business in the Philippines,” Cristobal explained.

The WTO TFA, a key component of the Doha Development Agenda, aims to speed up the movement, clearance, and release of goods across borders. The agreement pushes for advance rulings and pre-arrival processing, the use of electronic payment and a single window, customs cooperation and coordination, and reduced documents and formalities with common customs standards.

Negotiations on the agreement started in 2004, and the pact will enter into force once two-thirds of the WTO members have completed their domestic ratification process.

For the Philippines to ratify the WTO TFA, it must submit its Instrument of Acceptance signed by President Benigno Aquino III to the WTO through its Philippine mission in Geneva.

The TFA is also consistent with customs reform initiatives advocated in other international fora such as the World Customs Organization, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation’s Trade Facilitation Action Plans and activities of its Sub-Committee on Customs Procedures, and ASEAN trade facilitation initiatives.

In the Philippines, customs reforms are currently underway, centered on the passage of the Customs Modernization and Tariff Act (CMTA) that was just recently ratified by Congress and up for signing by the President.

The CMTA seeks to adopt trade facilitation measures for fast import and export clearance. The legislation will also improve customs services through a simplified, secured, and harmonized cargo clearance process. The CMTA addresses as well the country’s international trade commitments, and deals with transparency and accountability issues at the Bureau of Customs (BOC).

DTI said that through the CMTA, the BOC’s importation and exportation procedures will become faster, more convenient, and more efficient—not just for the large businesses, but also for the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in the Philippines.

Trade undersecretary for industry development Dr. Ceferino Rodolfo said the TFA will significantly benefit MSMEs, as its rational, efficient, and simple rules will encourage greater participation in international trade.

“Our MSMEs can now easily export goods and finished products as well as import intermediate goods which will serve as industry inputs for processing and re-export, fully integrating our industries into the Global Value Chain (GVC). This will result into a spill over effect to other industries, thus generating jobs, disseminating upgraded technology, and advancing the skills and capability of our local entrepreneurs,” Rodolfo said.

The Philippines serves as a crucial processing link along the global value chain, both as a source of and destination for intermediate goods, with a 56% overall participation rate as measured by the share of foreign value added to total exports. The country was ranked eighth in the list of the top 25 developing economy exporters in the 2013 World Investment Report of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.

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