KARACHI: International Customs Day was celebrated by the officers and staff of Pakistan Customs throughout the country with zeal and fervor on January 26, 2017. Proceedings started with flag hoisting ceremony at Customs Houses and events were held in connection with the International Customs Day celebrations.
In Islamabad on the occasion of World Customs Day, Collector Islamabad Dr Arslan made the the welcome speech while Chief Collector Ms Sarwat Tahira Habib and Member Admin addressed the ceremony. Acting Chairman Dr Muhammad Irshad also spoke on the occasion and admired the performance of Pakistan Customs and pledged to support the department.
Member Customs Nasir Masroor was the chieg guest of the ceremonies held in Karachi. Chief Collector South Abdul Rasheed Shaikh and Chief Collector Enforcement Zahid Khokhar gave the welcome address.
Director Training Karachi Ms. Zeba Bashir in her speech said data analysis is a process of inspecting, cleansing, transforming and modeling data with the goal of discovering useful information, suggesting conclusions and supporting decision making.
“As we know the world has never been smaller than it is today and it brings along several challenges and threats, which are beyond the capacity of a single nation to handle unilaterally”.
Pakistan’s increasing imports and recently launched CPEC pose a challenge that Pakistan Customs ahs to face. The quantum of trade will increase tremendously and handling such volume merely on basis of blind physical controls without having an intelligent and robust risk management system based on enriched data analysis model will be precarious.
Collector MCC Appraisement West Dr. Fareed Iqbal Qureshi said in the contemporary world, governments are under pressure to perform more efficiently and effectively. Revenue administrations are no exception, as they have to balance the decreasing resources and ever-increasing risks, often in difficult economic circumstances.
While the traditional methods for managing risk had, served the authorities well, the increasingly complex trading environment and concomitant growth in the regulatory framework, has made it incumbent upon them to seek more advanced methods to combat fraud and wasteful resource allocation.
“Since Customs data is based on the globally accepted classification and coding system (HS code), it is particularly convenient to profile changes in industrial behavior as well as macroeconomic analysis. Such datasets can also enable customs to identify anomalies that are indicative of commercial fraud or unethical conduct,” Qureshi said.
Director General Customs Valuation Syed Tanveer Ahmed said they had achieved targets such as WeBOC had become paperless whle Income Tax, shipping lines, terminals, airports, ANF and other allied oufits have also been connected through WeBOC.
Single window operation and proper data Analysis is not possible unless all the ministries are connected via the WeBOC system. A legal framework is required to be in place to effect this inter-connection system and subsequent data analysis. Pakistan may also develop a data and information sharing code within Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
The governor of Punjab Malik Muhammad Rafique Rajwana graced the occasion as chief guest in Lahore. Member HRM Federal Board of Revenue Rozi Khan Burki was also present besides the Chief Collector Customs (Central), Samaira Nazir, Officials of the US Consulate, officers of various departments including Police, ANF, CAA, Railways, President Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Collectors and Directors of Customs Central Region.
Zulfiqar Younas Collector Preventive in his opening remarks briefed the audience about the theme of international customs day for 2017 which is Data Analysis for effective border management. He also shared information about various projects initiated by the customs for the welfare and capacity building of the customs staff.
Chief RTO Jahanzaib Mehmood was and former member FBR Sher Nawaz graced the event at MCC Peshawar. Collector Peshawar Qurban Ali Khan, Director ATT Mohammad Saleem, Additional Collectors Fazle Samad and Yusuf Haider, Deputy Collector Zakir Mohammad and other staff also attended the ceremonies.
Certificates of merit were awarded among the officers/officials of Pakistan Customs for their meritorious services.
Later, in the afternoon, liquor and other contraband goods seized by the field formations of Pakistan Customs Central Region were destroyed and put to fire at various Customs stations in the country. However, no event was held at MCC Quetta due to heavy snowfall.
In Karachi Certificates of Merit were awarded to Additional Collectors Farrukh Shareef, Rehmat Ullah Vistro, Dr. Shahab Imam, Rana Tasleem Akhtar; Deputy Collectors Rizwan Mahmood, Javed Sarwar Sheikh, Moeen Afzal Ali, Shakir Muhmmmad, Ihsan Ullah Shah, Abdul Qudoos, Ms. Marium Mehdi Raja, Sheeraz Ahmed, Ms. Arma Hassan, Moazzam Raza, Ali Raza Turabi, Shaukat Hayat, Jahanzeb Abbasi; Assistant Collectors Syed Itrat Hussain, Muhammad Arslan Majeed Rana, Kaleemullah, Mukhtar Ali Sheikh, Shabbir Ahmad Phulpotu.
Other officials receiving the certificate include Riaz Ahmed Chaudhary, Muhammad Zeeshan Baig, Umair Ahmed, Muhammad Hadi, Ghazi Khan, Ms. Hasina Khanum, Muhammad Farooq, Taha Sher Behan, Abdul Hameed Cohan, Muhammad Murtaza, Aziz Sarwar, Arshad Ahmad, Ishtiaq Ahmed Khan, Muhammad Umar Baloch, Nasir Masood Jafri , Muhammad Asim Awan, Saud Hassan Khan, M. Aslam, Asrar Ahmad, Muneer Hussain Iqbal, Malik Safdar Ali, Rao Abdul Ghayoor, Shabbir Ahmed Bhutto, Muhammad Saleem Khokar, Ahmed Ali, Jamshed Ali, Shahid Ahmed, Taj Muhammad, Wajid Kamal, Zafar Imam, Iftikhar Ali Sheikh, Masroor Ahmed, Zahid Hussain, Tauseef Hameed, Tariq Ahmed Pathan, Dilawar Shah, Muhammad Shayan, Ghulam Mustafa, Abdul Wahid, Ejaz Ahmed, Muhammad Idress , Muhammad Saleem, Muhammad Salahuddin Khan, Ahmed Ali, Abdus Salam.