MoIT orders issuing the C/O for exported farm produce as soon as possible

Especially, giving priority to granting the Certificated of Origin for farm produce for export from two provinces of Bac Giang and Hai Duong as soon as possible.

The move came after the director of the department Phan Van Chinh recently signed the document No334/XNK-XXHH, asking Import-Export Management Office in localities to create the most favourable conditions when they granted C/O for exported farm produce.

Under the document, the department said due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, many localities nation-wide were applying lockdown or social distancing, making it difficult to consume farm produce.

The document also required relevant agencies to give priority to issuing C/O for exported farm produce, including farm produce that are in the harvest season, having a short harvest time, such as lychee.

The Import-Export Management Office in Ha Noi City and provinces of Hai Duong, Lang Son, Quang Ninh and Lao Cai, based on the actual workload, were told to arrange staff to work overtime, including working on Saturday, Sunday and holidays to quickly process the C/O application, the document said.

Besides, the department also tasked the Import-Export Management Office in localities in the northern border area to closely monitor the customs clearance situation at border gates and report to the department if there was any sign of exported farm produce being stuck at the border gates, the document said.

Statistics show that Import-Export Management Offices across the country have issued 420,000 sets of C/O, worth USD21 billion for exported goods to foreign markets that benefited preferential treatment from free trade agreements in the first four months of this year.

In a related movement, the trade ministry has also sent the document No 2926/BCT-XNK to the People’s Committee of localities on the export of farm produce via the border.

Accordingly, the ministry asked the People's Committee of the northern border provinces to direct local authorised agencies to apply green channels for qualified exported lychees and encourage businesses to export goods via the official channels.

The committees were also required to strengthen discussion with Chinese authorities to create favorable conditions and raise the customs clearance time for farm produce exported from Viet Nam that are during the time of harvest, especially, lychees during the time of main harvest, the ministry said.

The ministry also ordered the committees to continue regularly updating and reporting on the progress of delivery and customs clearance of farm produce as well as related issued at the border gate so that the ministry and relevant sectors could timely take proper actions to deal with.

The ministry assigned the People’s Committee of provinces and cities, having exported farm produce via the border, to constantly update the situation from the northern border provinces to proactively fix the situation and make adjustment the speed of transporting farm produces to the border in accordance with the customs clearance capacity of the border gates.

Besides, the People's Committee of provinces and cities that had exported farm produces via the border needed to strengthen providing information related to exported farm produce via the northern border to farmers, producers and farm produce processing companies.

Specifically, farmers, producers and processing and exported farm produce companies should actively update the progress of goods clearance at northern border gates to make plans for production and packaging, transporting farm produce to avoid congestion and other adverse impacts, the ministry said.

They were also told to rapidly and strongly shift the export activities of goods to the Chinese market in the form of official channels, including buying and selling under contracts with clear trading and delivery conditions, delivering goods at international border gates and main border gates, the ministry added.

Moreover, farmers, producers and processing and exported farm produce companies should strictly implement regulations on traceability of goods, cultivation area codes, packing facilities, labeling as well as other relevant requirements to improve the product quality and meet regulations and standards agreed with foreign customers, the ministry said.