By Manny Piñol
Just as earlier reported, Sanitary and Pytho-Sanitary (SPS) documents issued by the Dept. of Agriculture which would allow importers to bring in agricultural products are indeed being recycled and reused by unscrupulous importers.
This was discovered as the Dept. of Agriculture ordered a review and revalidation of SPS clearances and import permits earlier issued by the agency over the last four months.
What was also alarming was the discovery that there are private importers who hold as much as 180 import documents some of which are not being used.
I was also surprised to find out that the processing of the import permits is being done by a private group, Intercommerce.com.ph, which gets a fee of P50 per transaction that it processes on line.
Early tonight, I met with the officers of the Philippine Association of Meat Processors Inc. (PAMPI) who assured me that they will cooperate with the DA in weeding out unscrupulous traders who bring in misdeclared meat products.
While they admitted that their business was adversely affected by the strict measures being implemented by the DA now, they are hopeful that the smugglers masquerading as importers would finally be weeded out.
To facilitate the validation of highly perishable and live items, the DA has established a fast lane to give priority to he processing of the documents.
So here’s my message to the smugglers of agricultural and fisheries products: “It ain’t business as usual anymore!”
(Photo shows some of the recycled SPS permits which were retrieved by the DA team.)
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