KARACHI: The Directorate General of Customs Valuation has revised the customs values of zinc ingots through Valuation Ruling No 1154/2017 under Section 25A of the Customs Act, 1969.
According to details, the Directorate General of Customs Valuation conducted an audit of clearance values of the subject goods and found the same to be varying between US$1.513 per kilogram to US$2.90 per kilogram in import data of previous 90 days.
The variation observed the the import data was abnormal as the subject goods are of 99.99% purity. The international trading prices were examined and accordingly an exercise was undertaken to determine the Customs Values of zinc ingots containing 99.99% zinc content, in terms of Section 25-A of the Customs Act, 1969.
During hearing proceedings, the stakeholders pointed out that base-metals like zinc ingots of 99.9% purity are traded against LME cash official settlement prices, from LME-registered warehouses, with varying premium charges. Meetings were held on 19-04-2017 with all the stakeholders including local manufacturers and importers, of subject goods participated in the meetings. All aspects affecting the clearance values were discussed in detail and accordingly, keeping the nature of the goods i.e. 99.99% purity, it was agreed that the LMB values of the relevant dates shall be the criterion for valuation and the allied freight / logistic charges shall be included.
Valuation methods provided in Section 25 of the Customs Act, 1969 were duly applied in their regular sequential order to address the particular valuation issue at hand. The transaction value method as provided in Sub-Section (1) of Section 25, found inapt in light of the wide variety of import declarations contrary to the international selling prices.
Hence requisite information required under law was not available to arrive at the correct transaction value. Identical / similar goods value method provided vide Sub-Sections (5) & (6) of Section 25 ibid were examined for applicability to determine Customs.
