KARACHI: Collector, Model Customs Collectorate MCC Appraisement West Dr Fareed Iqbal Qureshi says that in the contemporary world, governments are under pressure to perform more efficiently and effectively.
In his message on the eve of International Customs Day, the Collector said that the revenue administrations are no exception, as they have to balance the decreasing resources and ever-increasing risks, often in difficult economic circumstances. While the traditional methods for managing risk had, served the authorities well, the increasingly complex trading environment and concomitant growth in the regulatory framework, has made it incumbent upon them to seek more advanced methods to combat fraud and wasteful resource allocation. To effectively deal with this scenario, customs administrations are turning to data analysis for improvement in their business processes, resulting in better compliance management and enhanced service delivery.
The significance of the data accumulated through Customs clearance applications is important as it covers modes of transportation, frequency of cross-border transaction (both travel and importation), value and source of goods which in combination with information from other agencies can enable customs to look beyond the singularity of the transaction and actually view the profiles of companies, industries, or countries. Since Customs data is based on the globally accepted classification and coding system (HS code), it is particularly convenient to profile changes in industrial behavior as well as macroeconomic analysis. Such datasets can also enable customs to identify anomalies that are indicative of commercial fraud or unethical conduct.
On the other hand data collected through the Customs clearance applications e.g. WeBOC, ASYCUDA etc. is of great value to other government agencies that are also involved in border activities e.g. transnational organized crime, human smuggling, money laundering etc. just to name a few. Such agencies can use trade / traveler data to improve their enforcement and compliance leve
