HCM City (VNA) - Customs Department of HCM City has said it would cut by half theamount of processing time to complete customs documents for import and exportbusinesses.

DinhNgoc Thang, deputy head of the department, said the number of customsdeclaration documents at the city’s customs offices accounted for 40 percent ofthe country’s total.

Thecity has about 140,000 enterprises. The city’s budget revenue represents 45 percentof the country’s budget, so the development of enterprises in the city plays animportant role in national economic development, Thang said.

Hesaid the time to complete customs declarations had been reduced, accounting nowfor about 28 percent of customs clearance time, while other customs formalitiestake up the remaining 72 percent.

Processingdoes not exceed more than one workday.  

TheCustoms Department has also opened a checking station at a customs branch at SaigonPort Area No 1 (at Cat Lai Port) and a checking station at a customs branch aswell as an emergency-express customs branch at Tan Son Nhat InternationalAirport.

Thetwo checking stations will work with eight specialised agencies to manage andcheck goods, and help businesses complete customs formalities more quickly.

Thestations and eight agencies also plan to improve information services such asthe monitoring and reporting of checked goods. 

TheCustoms Department said that businesses, specialised agencies and customsoffices would regularly exchange information about checked batches of goods.-VNA