Addressing at a recent business dialogue meeting on taxation and customs jointly held in Hanoi by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and the Ministry of Finance, Mr Pham Gia Tuc, Vice President and General Secretary of VCCI, said the Government has basically entered the second phase of the Project 30. In fact, authorities have reviewed more than 5,700 administrative procedures and proposed cutting off 81 percent. The Prime Minister signed a decision to abolish 258 sets of administrative procedures, including 61 administrative procedures in taxation and customs.
More response from businesses needed
According to the guidelines of the Ministry of Finance, dialogues on customs and tax issues with companies will not only be carried out at central level but also at local level. Local customs and taxation authorities will make reports in every six months. Dialogues will be regularly held by specialised departments directly subordinated to the ministry. Local-level dialogues will be opened on the basis of enterprises’ requests while central level meetings will be based on selective regime and invitations from the ministry and VCCI.
Mr Do Hoang Anh Tuan, Deputy Finance Minister, said: Apart from direct meetings and dialogues, enterprises should exchange their viewpoints on forums. He said the Ministry of Finance is seeking comments on a circular on the implementation of the Resource Tax Law but it had received only three remarks in the past two months.
Public administration reform is considered a key task in 2010 and subsequent years, aiming to help enterprises to save time and cut unnecessary costs. “We expect enterprises and taxation authorities to shift from manual tax declarations into electronic platform but the supporting voice from enterprises is occasional.
Trimming administrative procedure
In the first phase of the scheme from 2007 to 2010, the Ministry of Finance had reviewed 840 administrative procedures under its authority, including 338 procedures involved in tax, fees and charges and 239 procedures related to customs. With a thorough review, the Ministry of Finance proposed to simplify 100 percent tax-related administrative procedures, 95 percent customs administrative procedures and 51 percent of treasury procedures. It proposed amendments and supplements to 480 procedures and abolition 30 procedures. Particularly, the tax field requires changes and replacements in 256 out of 330 procedures while the customs sector needs changes and replacements in 179 out of 239 procedures. Expectedly, as many as 31 percent of administrative procedures will be streamlined to save yearly expenditures of VND3,031 billion.
In the second phase, the ministry has instructed the General Department of Taxation, the General Department of Customs and other subordinates to seriously review administrative procedures for simplification.
With respect to the tax field, the review pointed out procedures for eradication, four to be replaced, 243 procedures to be amended and 80 administrative procedures to be simplified. As much as 76 percent of procedures are expected to be simplified and 36.1 percent will be trimmed. With reference to the customs field, examiners proposed amending, replacing or repealing 179 out of 239 procedures, which have been publicly published on websites of the General Department of Customs, provincial customs authorities and others. After careful review, the Ministry submitted 44 procedures for immediate streamlining.
Huyen Nhi
Vietnamese
