ISLAMABAD: The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) has expressed concerns over the slow progress of agreement between Pakistan and China on Electronic Data Interchange (EDI).
Sources told Customs Today that there is a huge difference in figures reveled by Chinese Customs on its exports to Pakistan and the Pakistani import data from China allegedly due to under invoicing, causing revenue losses amounting to billion of rupees.
According to unofficial figures, this differences is $6 to 7 billion but the FBR officials put the estimated difference between $4 and $5 billion.
In response to a query, FBR Chairman Dr Muhammad Irshad told Customs Today that imports worth $4 billion are still questionable and missing under the shade of mis-declaration. “I have ordered investigation into the issue and have also directed stern action against the importers involved in mis-eclaration but due we need cooperation from the Chinese customs in this regard,” he said, adding that the FBR seeks progress on EDI agreement with China.
However, he expressed the hope that technical arrangement with China for EDI would be soon finalized.
It is pertinent to mention here that already Federal Board of revenue has been issued an alert on the issue of mis- declaration on import from China. The FBR had also showed concerned over the unwanted concessions granted under various Situatory Regulatory Orders (SROs) covering preferential trade and free trade agreement. FBR sources has disclosed that it seems that China is not taking interest and want to shelve the matter despite the all efforts from FBR China customs response is very slow and also not encouraging.
