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Customs clearance system unchanged over logjam fears
Inland clearance depots in Ho Chi Minh City have received temporary approval to continue offering customs clearance services amid worries that a change in the system could lead to serious port logjams.
The General Department of Vietnam Customs on Thursday said five inland clearance depots managed by the HCMC Customs Department’s Saigon Port Customs Sub-department Zone 4 can provide certain clearance services for imports and exports, including temporarily imported goods for re-export and goods transferred between ports or border gates.
The depots, however, will have to stop clearing transit goods starting October 15.
The general customs department says the decision will support seaports in HCMC to avoid being congested with containers before the prime minister makes a final decision.
Instead of having goods cleared at seaports, import and export businesses often obtain customs clearance documents at the Tanamexco, Phuoc Long, Transimex, Phuc Long and Ben Nghe inland clearance depots.
But last month, the Saigon Port Customs Sub-department Zone 4 announced that the five clearance depots were not authorized to clear goods, citing a 2005 government decision. From October 1, goods have to be cleared at seaports.
The announcement was immediately followed by warnings of possible logjams at city seaports if the depots were not allowed to receive and dispatch imports and export goods, especially given that the flow of goods often increase in the last months of the year.
The five inland clearance depots claim that their work had eased congestion at seaports. Last year, for example, they handled about 1.7 million TEUs (Twenty-foot Equivalent Units).
Moreover, as most goods are transported by rivers and sea between the depots and seaports, container trucks do not have to pass the city center, where traffic flow is already too heavy. With transport costs reduced, businesses can lower their prices and are thus more competitive, the inland clearance depot managers said.
About 4,000-5,000 containers a day are handled at the depots and if they are not transported into or out of the depots by sea, they will cause road traffic congestion, Tuoi Tre newspaper said Friday, citing Transimex inland clearance depot General Director Nguyen Chi Thien.
Saigon Port, which only has space for 10,000 containers but receives an average of 1,000 containers a day, is expecting to get clogged. Nguyen Van Minh, deputy general director of Saigon Port, said most of the goods that passed through the port came from the inland clearance depots, so blockages would occur if goods were not cleared at the depots before arriving at the port.
He said he expected many other seaports in the south to be affected if the inland depots are asked to stop providing clearance services.
A manager of ZIM Integrated Shipping Services Company, who did not wish to be named, said importers and exporters have been worried that transportation costs will surge if containers are transported directly to seaports.
For example, it will cost US$45 more to transport a container from Dong Nai Province’s Bau Xeo Industrial Zone to a HCMC seaport than it would to carry the container to an inland clearance depot.
The manager also said if goods were stuck in traffic, cargo ships would be delayed.
On October 2, only one day after the depots could not deal with customs clearance documents, the HCMC Customs Department said the transport of goods through the city had already started backing up.
Thanhnien
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