Smuggling crackdown expands

Smuggling crackdown expands

By Aye Thida Kyaw   |   Monday, 15 July 2013

The Ministry of Commerce plans to expand its crackdown on illegal border trade this month to increase government revenues, officials said.

The ministry will send new teams of inspectors to ports to examine containers, following the success of its "mobile teams" who began cracking down on illegal trade over land routes to China and Thailand last November, deputy director U Soe Aung said last week.

Ministry officials found that in the first half of the last fiscal year trade along the Thai border was undervalued by Myanmar officials. Thai data showed trade totalling about US$820 million, while Myanmar officials put it at $85

million.

The mobile inspection teams found 1762 case of illegal trade between last November and June, with a total value of about K7 billion (about US$7 million), U Soe Aung said.

"We started in border towns, but sea routes are more important as they account for 80 percent of trade," he added.

Most illegal imports are fuel, handsets and electronics, cigarettes and consumer goods, while the most common illegal exports are jade and forestry products, according to data on seizures of illegal goods.

The new inspection teams will comprise officials from three commerce ministry departments as well as members of the police force, port authority and business associations.

U Soe Aung said the ministry is waiting for approval from the Yangon Region government before it launches its new inspections.

"We are ready to go," he added.

Source: http://www.news.myanmaronlinecentre.com/2013/07/18/smuggling-crackdown-expands/