Ghana has commenced a new regime of import duty on all cargoes landing in that country, in a move that will positively attract cargoes to the West African country,
Shipping Position Daily confirmed that under the new regime of taxes, import duty has been slashed by as much as 50 per cent.
Ghana’s Vice President; Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, who disclosed this said, benchmark value of import duties will be slashed by 50 per cent while importers of vehicles will enjoy a 30 per cent reduction.
Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia said the duty cut will “reduce the incidence of smuggling and enhance revenue, the benchmark or delivery values of imports have been reduced by 50 percent except for vehicles which will be reduced by 30%”
“This means, for example, if a container was previously assessed for duty at a value of $20,000, it will now be assessed from tomorrow at a value of $10,000. We expect that the higher volumes of at least 50% annually and increase custom revenue,” the Vice President said.
Apart from import duty reduction, Ghana cargo importation and clearance have been synchronized under the Single Window System. The process has also been subjected to deployment of IT, by the use of mobile applications(app).
According to the Vice President, the physical examination of containers is to be reduced from over 90% to under 10% by June 2019, and Customs and any other government operatives at the ports should adhere to the recommendations of the risk engine under the paperless regime.
He stated that the risk engine allows for the incorporation of specific intelligence on containers.
“Where containers are selected by the risk engine for examination, there will be a joint examination which must include National Security. There should no longer be separate examinations of containers by any government operative at the gates of exit,” Dr. Bawumia told a cheering auditorium.
Again, he announced that government will begin the implementation of the First Port Rule in June 2019 so that duty on all transit items will be paid at our port to the Customs representatives of the country of destination.
“We will implement a strict “no duty no exit” policy for containers without exception. This will block leakages and increase revenue. Going forward, Ghana will adopt a flat fee structure for port and customs charges for any new single window operator in line with best practices of charges at major ports globally,” Chairman of EMT said”, he said.
The Ghanaian Vice President also disclosed that “subject to Parliamentary approval, government will also implement the following measures on port charges to enhance the efficiency of port operations”
– Abolish service charge of $1.50 per ton of every export and reduce by 50% the $2.0 per ton of every import levied by Ghana Shippers Authority.
– Abolish importer registration fees imposed by the Ghana Standards Authority.
– Abolish the recently introduced Eazy Pass levy of up to 0.5% of the CIF value of goods by Ghana Standards Authority.
– Review the security charge of $0.50 per gross tonnage of every vessel coming into Ghana’s waters charged by Ghana Maritime Authority (GMA).
– Reduce by 50 per cent the $7 per new tyre eco levy charged by EPA, and replace the eco levy of 0.5% CIF value charged by EPA on a number of import items by a flat fee.
The Vice President of Ghana also disclosed that, in order to deal with the lack of information on the status of a consignment and the duty payment, a mobile app has been developed to enable importers to check the status of their consignment and the import duty payable online.
“The app can be obtained on Google Play store and will also soon be available on iTunes. It is called the Ghana Trade Hub mobile app. An importer just needs to have an Import Declaration Form number to access the information,” he said.
While Nigeria’s neighbours; Ghana, Togo, and Benin Republic have functional National Trade Platforms for trade facilitation, rivalry among government agencies has undermined the application of Single Window. The trio of Nigeria Customs Service, Nigerian Ports Authourity and the Nigerian Shippers’ Council have been competing for the control of a national trade platform.
The single window system is a trade facilitation idea and its implementation enables international traders to submit regulatory documents at a single location and or single entity.
According to the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) of the federal government, the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) collections would have increased by 90 percent if the National Single Window had been deployed in Nigerian ports.
The executive secretary of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC), Mr. Hassan Bello, also acknowledged that the lack of single window had affected the efficiency of the seaports. Bello said that single window will eliminate inefficiencies and lead to the simplification of documents and shorten the dwell time of cargoes at the seaports.
“It has affected the efficiency of our ports because the national single window is a trade facilitation platform preferably electronic that will bring all users and providers of shipping services together. The single window will eliminate inefficiencies and lead to simplification of documentation. “It will lead to transparency and shorten the dwell time of cargo. National single window and the Cargo Tracking Note are all trade facilitation platforms,” he said.
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