A foreign-aided model is undertaken to cut knotty steps in import-export process, dropping less-important ones, for expediting delivery of goods out of Bangladesh's major customs ports.
Sources say customs authority under the National Board of Revenue (NBR) is going to introduce 'business process reengineering' mechanism with the support of USAID to curtail the number of import-clearance steps in sea, air and land ports.
Time and cost of import-export trade will be reduced by 30 to 40 per cent once the reengineering is completed, officials said.
The aid agency of the United Sates-USAID--is providing technical assistance to the customs authority of the revenue board and already has submitted a report by sorting out the "unnecessary steps occupying import-export process", the officials added.
"Validation of the report has already been done and it would be placed for approval by the high-ups," says a senior NBR official.
After the report gets the seal of approval from the NBR chief, a dissemination programme would be held to share the report recommendations with the stakeholders, he adds.
Sources said the port authority, Biman and other entities are also involved with the process of validation of the report.
The process on submission of hard copies and other manual steps would be automated while some other steps would be merged to cut the Gordian knots deterring the country's foreign trade that particularly impacts the domestic market, among other adversities.
The move comes following detection of lengthy process in a recent report of Time Release Study-2022, conducted by customs officials with the support of the World Customs Organisation.
The TRS survey found importers having to complete the import-clearing process by passing through 32 steps at Chattogram seaport -- the largest export-import hub of the country.
It takes 28 steps at Benapole, the largest land port, and 25 at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka.
TRS is a method endorsed by the WCO for measuring the time taken by the authorities concerned to give the all-clear to import-export cargoes.
It found importers and customs brokers mainly responsible for delays in the customs-clearance process.
Importers and their authorised customs brokers take most part of the time - from 72 to 78 per cent of the clearance time.
In Chattogram, importers and customs brokers take up 75 per cent of the total release time, followed by port authority 14 per cent, customs 8.0 per cent, other government organisations 2.0 per cent and shipping agents 1.0 per cent.
The customs authority consumes 7.0 per cent of the time at Benapole land port to issue clearance while it is 6.6 per cent at the Dhaka airport.
The TRS capacity-building project was funded by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) of Switzerland through the WCO-SECO Global Trade Facilitation Programme (GTFP).
However, clearing and forwarding agents (C&F) allege that network disruption and slow speed of the internet linger clearance process of goods in customs ports.
They say C&F and customs authorities have to work together to speed up the import goods-clearance process.
A senior customs official said the officials in Chattogram custom house is awfully occupied with multiple tasks as import-export volume shoots up over the time.
During fiscal year 2013-2022, the number of import bills of entry processed by CCH registered a 161.1-percent rise. In FY 2022, imports worth $ 73.3 billion and exports worth $ 37.6 billion were processed through CCH.
However, manpower and infrastructure have not been developed on that scale to manage such large volumes of export-import goods.
Customs officials said once the ongoing National Single Window (NSW) project would be completed, the process of import-export would be faster.
The customs authority has started moving to introduce paperless system without human intervention but other associated entities have to be automated too.
The NBR has signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with 38 public and private entities to implement the NSW.
