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MANILA - The Bureau of Customs has allowed quarantine personnel of the Department of Agriculture to issue import documents, a move that hog raisers expect would help address smuggling of meat products.
Edwin Chen, Pork Producers Federation of the Philippines president, said he expects to see “better” results in the coming weeks, once the new system of quarantine inspection is in place.
“Initially, the Customs has been hesitant to provide us the copy of the IFM. But now we have agreed that all quarantine officers will now be given a copy of importation documents for all agricultural imports,” Chen said, after emerging from a meeting with the DA.
IFMs or inward foreign manifests contain the list of all incoming imports per vessel, and the details of the commodities and their declared values – information that is crucial in determining if the shipments bear smuggled meat and other agricultural products.
The documents can also be used by quarantine personnel to check if the cargo subject of inspection conforms to the veterinary quarantine certificate issued by the DA-Bureau of Animal Industry.
“This is a welcome development and we expect to see results,” Chen said, adding that the new system is scheduled for implementation by first week of July.
On Tuesday, hog industry representatives met with Customs Commissioner Ruffy Biazon and Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala to discuss possible solutions to curb smuggling.
During the meeting, Alcala said stakeholders agreed to the creation of a technical group that would train quarantine officers assigned to all ports of entry, particularly on accessing the IFMs.
The DA chief also said Customs agreed to conduct tighter inspection of all pork and meat products that are valued 10 to 15 percent lower than the reference prices set by the country of origin.
If found undervalued, DA quarantine personnel may reject the inspection and clearance of the imported goods, unless importers show proof of correct payment of duties and taxes of the importation.
"These imported goods will be subject to an investigation," Alcala said.
The Philippines will seek the assistance of foreign ambassadors on the issuance of reference prices to regularly update Customs and DA-BAI personnel on the correct pricing of imported meat products, he said.
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