Greater effort and more resources needed in war against smuggling

Director of the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s market management department Nguyen Hung Dung spoke to Cong Thuong (Industry and Trade) newspaper about the fight against smuggling and counterfeit goods.

Increased purchasing power has created favourable conditions for counterfeit and smuggled products to enter the market. What measures has the department taken to prevent this?

Adopting the Prime Minister’s directive and others, the Central Steering Committee for Anti-Trafficking, Counterfeit Goods and Trade Fraud has instructed relevant agencies to increase inspections during the upcoming Tet (Lunar New Year) festival while monitoring food safety and hygiene as well as price stability to ensure the consumer price index doesn’t increase.

Previous inspections have shown that the majority of products are smuggled by land. The department has set up three inspection teams to tackle the problem.

Authorised agencies have continued to seize tens of tonnes of products smuggled over the Lang Son border, mainly by rail. What do you think about that?

A large amount of smuggled products enter the local market via Dong Dang railway station in Lang Son. The station is within the border belt, and many residents live nearby. Most of them make a living through trading which makes it difficult to differentiate between smugglers and honest citizens.

In addition, smugglers make use of a policy that allows people living along the border who are exempt from export tax for products worth less than VND2 million (US$100) per person per day to smuggle goods, thus causing difficulties for authorised agencies.

Those same agencies are already short of manpower and it is difficult for them to carry out regular checks, especially when smugglers use the cover of night or rainy days to illegally transport goods into the country.

The combination of weak infrastructure and these complexities makes it difficult to get to the root of the problem. With Tet approaching, authorised agencies are taking it in turns to mount a round the clock guard over high risk areas. However, in my opinion, it is more important to have a plan for authorised agencies to co-operate with each other.

What measures have authorised agencies taken to prevent locals from taking advantage of priority policies along the border to help smugglers?

Market inspectors, customs officers and border guards are developing a joint circular to ensure residents along the border only purchase products for personal consumption, rather than helping smugglers. It will regulate that all products must be certified by customs officers before being allowed to enter Viet Nam.

What is the vision for market inspections in 2011?

Market inspectors define the fight against smuggling and trade fraud as the key task of 2011, focusing on preventing counterfeit and low-quality products entering the country. Counterfeit goods are produced both in and outside of the country. Orders are even made for products to be produced abroad before being smuggled into Viet Nam for sale. Careful monitoring of products entering the domestic market from border areas is very important, and authorised agencies need to co-ordinate with each other effectively.

In addition, the fight against counterfeit, low-quality products and smuggling is the responsibility of the whole of society and the political system. Businesses also have a responsibility to work with authorised agencies to analyse and flag counterfeit products.-Viet Nam News