Russia-Belarus customs integration implies unification of customs administration - FCS

<p> MINSK, Oct 15 - PrimePress. The integration of Russia and Belarus in the customs area implies the unification of customs administration, said Ruslan Davydov, Deputy Head of the Federal Customs Service (FCS) of Russia. </p> <p>   </p> <p> “The most important thing is to increase the transparency of commodity flows and deepen the exchange of information. Since 2009 we (Russia and Belarus – editor’s note) have been coordinating risk indicators and want to speed up the work to have the same risk profiles for the majority of goods, especially for flowers, footwear, apparel and mass consumption goods. To avoid customs clearance overflows, aggressive optimization schemes,” Davydov said in an interview with the Russian newspaper Vedomosti. </p> <p>   </p> <p> According to him, the Federal Customs Service proposes to introduce the same tax and customs conditions for the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) countries. “In the future, uniform rules should be extended to all five EEU countries so that it would be impossible to import goods into the common market with violations through any of the countries,” he said. </p> <p>   </p> <p> The differences make room for optimization schemes, unjustified cross-flows of customs clearance of goods, when, taking advantage of the difference in tax conditions, importers import goods from third countries through the territory of the EEU neighbours in order to save money. “A level playing field is needed so that it is not artificially created economic benefits that compete, but foreign trade actors due to the quality of their services,” Davydov said. </p> <p>   </p> <p> He said that there are no customs, sanitary, or veterinary controls on the Russian-Belarusian border in mutual trade. But a post-control measure, mobile teams of the Federal Customs Service on the Russian territory in the border regions can stop vehicles with the capacity of over 3.5 tonnes and check the legal status of the imported goods. </p> <p>   </p> <p> Russia and Belarus are already governed by the Common Customs Code of the Eurasian Economic Union, so we are talking about the convergence of tax legislation. In particular, the countries have agreed on common principles of collection of indirect taxes (VAT, excises) and the introduction of an integrated system of administration of such taxes. </p> <p>   </p> <p> The basic VAT rate in Belarus is 20%; for some categories of goods there are zero and 10% rates, as in Russia. But telecommunication services in Belarus are subject to a higher VAT rate of 25%. </p> <p>   </p> <p> “In terms of customs control, tobacco excise rates should be equalised in the first place. Because of the strong gap in rates, cigarettes are much cheaper in Belarus. It’s no secret that Belarusian-made cigarettes account for the lion’s share of illegally imported cigarettes detected by our mobile groups. That is why one of the cooperation avenues is joint control over the delivery of the goods which are subject to different tax and excise rates,” said Davydov. </p> <p>   </p> <p> In August 2021, Belarus abolished zero VAT on goods imported for further re-export. “The benefit, which had been in effect for ten years, created real advantages by allowing Russian entrepreneurs to avoid paying VAT when importing goods through Belarus. Unfortunately, Kazakhstan introduced similar preferences this year,” Davydov said. End </p> <p>   </p>

2021-10-16

Primepress