The government is going to raise the penalty for any kind of forgery of GSP certificates in a move to prevent the trade offence which casts negative impacts on the country's image and the export facility, too, officials said.
Presently, an exporter is fined only Tk 5,000 for a normal offence related to GSP (generalised system of preferences) certificate tampering. The amount now can go up to Tk 50,000 in case of big offences.
"We are planning to raise penalty against dishonest businessmen who are involved in tampering with or forgery of GSP documents," vice-chairman of the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) Shubhashish Bose told the FE.
He said penalising a dishonest businessman with only Tk 5,000 could hardly make any impact these days.
"We may raise the penalty -- both the minimum and the maximum end--to stop such crime."
Mr Bose pointed out that mainly Khulna-based fish exporters are found involved in doctoring GSP documents. During the 2011-2013 period, many export consignments were sent to the European Union destinations through certificate tinkering.
He said sometimes the businessmen export goods beyond the amount mentioned in the GSP certificates during their issuance. In that case they resort to tampering. Â
Officials said the Bangladesh embassy in Paris had sent 17 forged GSP certificates and the French Customs also sent five more forged documents to the EPB for checking. And the ministry of commerce also received another 17 such documents from different sources.
The EPB is set to convene a meeting today (Thursday) to discuss the alleged forgeries and tampering with GSP documents with the stakeholders.
The export-promotion authority has noticed the offence continuing despite digitisation of the issuance of the GSP certificates. Especially, the documents issued by the Khulna office of EPB are being manipulated frequently.
Officials from the Department of Fisheries and representatives from the Bangladesh Frozen Food Exporters Association (BFFEA) have been asked to attend the meeting. Mr Bose will preside.
Contacted over the matter, BFFEA president SM Amzad Hossain told the FE Wednesday the issue of tampering with GSP certificates will be discussed during the meeting to find out how it happened.
He said these occurrences took place during 2011-13 period. Â
Mr Hossain claimed that after digitisation of issuance of the certificates such forgery is not taking place. "Forging GSP is not possible nowadays."
Former vice-president of BFFEA M Khalilullah said none of the genuine businessmen was involved in such act of forgery.
He said some dishonest businesspeople had sent shrimps and fishes from Myanmar with fake Bangladeshi GSP certificates tagged with the consignments in the past.
"Now there is no ban on shrimp and fish export from Myanmar to Europe and other destinations. So, such forgery is not taking place now."
Most of the Bangladeshi products enter European Union (EU) states without paying duties under a scheme styled 'Everything But Arms (EBA)'.
Bangladesh's commodities stay competitive on the EU market as they enjoy the trade preferences.
   syful-islam@outlook.com
Govt moves to raise fines to stop GSP certificate forgery
Syful Islam | Published: March 12, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00
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