Although Uganda is a land-locked country, it is now increasingly becoming clearer that we are land linked and we can be as competitive as any other country.
To achieve this competitiveness, a number of initiatives at both political, policy and administrative levels have been introduced. Such initiatives are important in improving the ease of doing business in Uganda and are geared towards making it easy to trade, transact and clear goods within the region.
These initiatives include; the operalization of Document Processing Centre (DPC), rolling out of Regional Electronic Cargo Tracking System (RECTS), Electronic Single Window (ESW), introduction of non-intrusive systems and the AEO programme.
With DPC, taxpayers will significantly benefit from a single document processing centre where all documentary check function for all customs declarations will be done.
In the past, customs document processing and assessment was happening in different parts of the country. This had challenges of monitoring, delays in clearance and quality of assessments done. The Customs department, therefore, reengineered the customs clearance procedures by implementing a Centralised Document Processing Centre with an aim of achieving the following objectives:
. Shorten customs declaration processing time by:
a) receiving declarations online and processing them relying on the scanned attached documents;
b) dedicating a team of all- round experienced customs staff to man the DPC;
c) isolating the DPC team from distractions/disruptions and to create a high-productivity environment.. Improve management control over the declaration processing function by ensuring that headquarter functions such as tariff, valuation, enforcement, National Targeting Centre and others, monitor the processand intervene in real time.
. Minimize staffs, cleaning agents’ and traders’ direct interaction with staff hence reduce time of clearance & integrity related issues which compromise compliance levels.. Enhance electronic clearance communication regarding document statuses via email or SMS, with the identities of the officials remaining anonymous to the trader.
For URA, this initiative hastaken away opportunities for staff to be compromised by clearing agents. Reason: access to DPC is restricted.
However, like any change, we will continue to support the different stakeholders and build their capacity to work with the new system. This will improve productivity, integrity and professionalism which are key to delivering a reliable and consistent service.
Other benefits are enhancement of specialization, improved control of declaration processing and easy implementation of standard operating procedures.
In the short term of DPC’s implementation, URA boasts of impressive customs revenue growth in January and February. These months posted growth of: 20.56% and 25.55% respectively compared to the average growth of 6.6% in the previous first half of the year.
Meanwhile, the DPC system has been implemented in other African revenue authorities like in Zimbabwe, Kenya, South Africa. For Uganda, the implementation will be done in a phased manner; which is, station by station starting with the stations with minimal declarations.
So far, six stations have been rolled out in; Mbale, Mbarara, Jinja, Kampala, Busia and Malaba. It is hoped that by April 15, 2017, all the customs stations in the country will have moved onto the DPC procedures.