International Trade Conference 4 Using exports information for imports data

Motivations / Benefits  Motivations / Benefits  Reduced burden on businesses  Earlier availability of exports data for risk assessments  Reduction in data entry errors  Improved statistics (according to APEC document)

Motivations / Benefits (continued)  Potential benefits??  Reduced costs to Customs agencies  Reduced costs to statistical agencies

Imports data  Generally considered better quality than exports  duty paid on value of imports –becoming less of an issue in some countries / some commodities  sales tax paid on value of imports  required for dumping investigations  imports detail often more important politically to a country than the exports detail –changing as export facilitation gains attention  importers may have better idea than exporters of final destination of goods

Imports data (continued)  However, importers may not know some details as well as exporters (e.g. state of origin)

Canadian / US experience  Imports to Canada from US become US exports to Canada  Imports to US from Canada become Canadian exports to US  Greater cooperation between agencies  Increased consistency  Allowed Customs resources to be diverted to monitoring imports

Rhetorical question  One data source = Consistency in bilateral reconciliation  Is this always good  Comparison of two sources can identify problems

Developments  WTO Standardised DataSet  facilitates international exchange of data  Australian experience –considerable work undertaken on dataset –case for business benefit not strong –desire to incorporate as systems redeveloped but interest waning

Developments (continued)  US requirement for advance imports data  NZ experience that exports data quality improved  Australia looking at advanced cargo reporting –traders consider it feasible but only if aligning with US approach  UK advice that EU considering exports as a single flow  can report in any member state  was this just exports outside EU??

Developments (continued)  From Australian Customs Service - Enhanced Trade Solutions 2015 Case study  test level of pre-population of Australian Customs full import declaration from info provided to NZ Customs on export  only being considered, at this stage, for businesses with which have complete or near complete consignment details (both export and import) at the time of export

Developments (continued)  initial analysis 12 fields pre-populated by the business –out of 65 fields on NZ Customs exports form –out of 166 fields on Australian Customs import form  further analysis 62 fields can be pre-populated and only 92 really required  about 65% of fields aligned with WTO model

Issues  Pressure from Customs / traders to align export and import classifications (possibly to HS 6 digit level)  Need huge amount of cooperation to succeed  US / Canada works well  NZ / Aus could work  but world wide???  Need changed attitude to exports data  How to build in quality assurance?