Customs bureau activates color lane to cut ‘distortions’
The Bureau of Customs (BOC) activated on Thursday a new color lane for medium-risk to high-risk cargoes in a bid to enhance trade facilitation while strengthening border protection and revenue collection.
In a statement, the BOC said it launched the “Orange” Lane in its Universal Risk Management System (URMS) as a new selectivity color in addition to the “Green,” “Yellow” and “Red” lanes.
Orange-tagged shipments shall pass through the x-ray scanning and once the image is found to be suspicious it shall be subjected to physical examination. On the other hand, goods declarations tagged “Red,” covering high-risk cargoes, shall be mandatorily subject to both x-ray scanning and physical examination. The “Yellow” lane is intended for cargoes with low to medium risk subject to document-check and the “Green” lane for cargoes with no to low risk.
Customs Assistant Commissioner and spokesperson Vincent Philip C. Maronilla told the Businessmirror their Risk Management Office (RMO) recommended for a new lane to “prevent further distortion of ‘Red
Lane’ shipments.”
Maronilla added
“there should be one clear rule for ‘Red Lane’ shipments and options as to the results of scanning should not be the determining factor as to whether or not red-tagged shipments should undergo physical examination.”
The RMO also underscored the analytics-based selection process through the use of a memory-based reasoning feature that enables risk and compliance prediction as an Artificial Intelligence tool promoting automation and lesser human intervention to assist traders. It added it has also been working to secure the pipeline of information and feedback mechanism through maximization of its data sources using modernized systems and upholding a viable structure of setting and updating Selectivity Screens in the thrust to sustain effective machine learning.
To support the continuous improvement of the URMS, the Customs Risk Management Steering Committee is continuously developing action plans encompassing all the areas in the delivery of an enhanced risk management system of the Customs bureau.