Law enforcers to be engaged to stop GSP certificate forgeries

Badrul Ahsan | Published: April 12, 2014 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

The government is set to engage law enforcement agencies to help stop forgeries of certificates under the European Union's generalised system of preferences (GSP), a high official said.
The move came following a suggestion from the visiting team of European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) last week.
Under the GSP regime of the European Union (EU), goods from Bangladesh enter the bloc without requiring payment of any duties.
"A six-member OLAF delegation visited Bangladesh last week and requested us to employ detective police to stop the forgery of GSP-related certificates. They said only the cancellation of GSP certificates or annulment of enlisting local parties is not enough to stop the forgery," a senior official at the Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) told the FE.
During the visit, around 267 GSP certificates were brought under scrutiny on suspicion of having been forged. Some 837 certificates were checked in 2012 for the purpose while the number of such certificates was around 3,200 in 2011 and 3,300 in 2010.
Officials said a number of Bangladeshi businessmen and a few countries, which are not eligible to enjoy EU's GSP facility, were involved in this fraudulent practice.
It has been found that in 2012 some 583 GSP certificates were issued to a number of factories, having no operational existence in Bangladesh.
Following discovery of the forgery of such certificates, the registration of several apparel factories was cancelled.
Speaking on the issue EPB Vice Chairman Shubhashish Bose told the FE that about one per cent of the total certificates issued against Bangladeshi export consignments were found to be forged.
He said most of the forged GSP certificates were found to have been issued not from Bangladesh. "They were issued from outside; maybe in connivance with Bangladeshi people or not", Mr Bose said.
"We have already taken approval from the ministry of commerce and talked with lawyers to find out ways to take legal actions if anyone is found involved in the forgery of the GSP certificates," he said.
Mr Bose said the OLAF officials were happy with the activities that Bangladesh has been carrying out to stop the forgery of GSP certificates.
"OLAF has signed memorandums of understanding (MoU) only with Bangladesh and Taiwan on this issue. It reflects their level of satisfaction over our activities," Mr Bose added.
However, a high official at the textile cell of EPB said if the department had enough manpower, then more success in bringing down GSP forgeries could be achieved.
The EPB VC said his office has long been facing an acute shortage of manpower for which he could not do more in this connection.
"We are in process of appointing more manpower in the office. After completion of recruitment, we will be able to assign more officers in the department," he informed the FE.
Meanwhile, expressing hope of achieving more success in controlling such forgeries soon, Mr Bose said his office has been working on automation of the process about issuing GSP certificates, with the help of the EU.
"We have almost completed all formalities of issuance of GSP certificates electronically. Hopefully it would come into effect from next month (May); following which forgeries will go down significantly," he added.
According to him, once the automated system is installed, the EPB, Bangladesh Bank, apex apparel bodies, and the ports will have access to it. All these parties will be able to check the status of the GSP certificates and also ascertain whether any forgery has taken place.