HÀ NỘI — The Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT) has decided to remove and simplify 54 administrative procedures in 10 sectors under its management including energy, import-export and food safety.

Minister Trần Tuấn Anh signed the declaration on April 27 to streamline administrative procedures, marking the third time that the ministry has cut its administrative procedures.

In the import-export sector, the ministry will remove the need to obtain a licence for tobacco imports for duty free trading. The licence was applied since 1998.

According to the revised Circular 03, dated January 13th 2014, the ministry will grant import licences to businesses within 10 days since receiving valid documents.

In the third reduction of administrative procedures, the MoIT will also reduce the time for granting certificates of free sale (CFS) for imported and exported goods.

The ministry reviewed and agreed to remove 9 administrative procedures relating registrating promotional campaigns that use a lucky draw. As a result, businesses no longer have to supply images of the products involved in the draw, and can receive the registration documents within three working days instead of seven.

The ministry also simplified 8 administrative procedures in food safety. Relating to Decree 109 on rice exports, which has been a topic of debate in past years, the ministry reduced the time for obtaining the necessary documents to export rice from 15 working days to 10.

Administrative procedures in other sectors including goods, measurement standards, competition management, alcohol trading, energy and electricity were also removed and simplified.

The ministry’s first administrative shakeup was implemented in December 2016, and reduced 123 administrative procedures out of the total 443.

Last year, MoIT continued to cut and simplify up to 183 administrative procedures. The ministry said the number of administrative procedures under its management had increased from 443 in 2016 to 451 in 2017, as some sectors under other ministries’ management was transferred to MoIT.

Experts said that the ministry’s reforms since 2016 have created favourable conditions for businesses and people to develop.

The MoIT has been the only ministry to meet the Government’s requirements in administrative procedure reduction. Moreover, the ministry has been praised for cutting 402 categories out of 702 import-export products which were under special check-ups. — VNS