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BOC positions itself as one of the top three customs agencies in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations by 2025
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The goal will be helped in part by the eight-point priority program it set for 2023
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The agency envisions itself “to become a modern and credible customs administration that upholds good governance and is among the world’s best”
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Acting Customs commissioner Yogi Filemon Ruiz said the agency is aspiring to be like the Singapore customs administration, which, he noted, is one of the best in the world
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BOC’s priorities for 2023 include intensifying anti-smuggling efforts, good governance and integrity, improving employees’ morale and welfare, and advancing digitalization, among other objectives
The Bureau of Customs aims to be among the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ (ASEAN) top three customs administrations by 2025.
Acting Customs commissioner Yogi Filemon Ruiz, in text messages to PortCalls, said this goal is in relation to such metrics as ease of doing business, paperless transactions, speedy facilitation of imports and exports, higher revenue collection efficiency, and minimal to zero complaints of corruption.
Ruiz said the agency is aspiring to be like the Singapore customs administration, which, he noted, is one of the best in the world.
The agency’s ambitious target is advanced by an eight-point priority program for 2023. In its 2022 accomplishment report provided to media during its 121st founding anniversary celebration on February 7, BOC outlined its eight-point priority program for this year as follows:
- Intensify anti-drug smuggling
- Enhance anti-agricultural product smuggling
- Strengthen mechanisms to prevent gun smuggling
- Sustain good governance and integrity program
- Improve moral and welfare of employees
- Advance customs digitalization
- Enhance streamlining of clearance of goods and reduce trade barriers
- Improve stakeholder engagement and inter-agency cooperation
It must be noted that the majority of priority objectives for 2023 were part of the seven-point priority program in place when Ruiz took over from Rey Leonardo Guerrero in July 2022.
BOC said this year’s priority program is in line with the administration’s eight-point socioeconomic agenda that aims to address both short-term and medium-term constraints to economic transformation. Since 2019, BOC has been identifying priority programs yearly geared towards accomplishing its organizational and operational targets for the year.
BOC also set a new vision beginning this year: “to become a modern and credible customs administration that upholds good governance and is among the world’s best.”
In support of the new vision, BOC said it “commits itself to enhancing trade facilitation, strengthening border control, and improving collection of lawful revenues, guided by the principles of professionalism, excellence, integrity, and accountability.”
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