On Sept 4th, Vietnam signed the protocol on the legal framework for the ASEAN single-window. Four days later, the country officially joined the ASEAN single-window and became one of the first four countries connecting to the mechanism with Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. According to experts, the mechanism will bring several benefits to those countries involved.
Joakim Parker, USAID Vietnam Mission Director said: The ASEAN single-window is an important mechanism once it’s fully implemented by ten countries, by integrating the supply chain, bringing businesses closer together, giving Vietnamese businesses in particular chance to more officially move goods and services across Vietnam borders.
Nguyen Manh Tung, Director, Customs IT and Statistics Department, General Department of Vietnam Customs added: The ASEAN single-window is a foundation to form the ASEAN Economic Community. With the mechanism, ASEAN countries can exchange information in not only customs area such as Customs Declaration Documents and Certificates of Origin but also other fields.
In addition, the mechanism will also make procedures simpler and help reduce time and costs of goods and services exchanges. However, in order to fully implement the ASEAN single-window, experts say that Vietnam needs to work more on the national single-window and human resources.
When talking about the ASEAN single-window, we need to consider the national single-window. It is important to build a 5-year plan. We are currently working with other ministries and agencies to summit the plan to the prime minister at the end of this year.
Joakim Parker, USAID Vietnam Mission Director said: Training small businesses in particular, working with business associations in the way we’ve been cursed through public dialogue and building capacity of customs department and other investments we’ve made as well will be essential to make possible for Vietnam to take full advantage of the single-window of being successful.
Vietnam and Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand will finish their technical preparations for the official launch of the regional single-window by December this year.
