WITHOUT A DOUBT, it takes a lawyer with customs background to make things move quicker at the Department of Agriculture Inspectorate and Enforcement office, created in 2022 but which remained toothless until now.
Since the recent appointment of lawyer and former Bureau of Customs (BOC) official, Assistant Secretary Ramon Cuyco, at the DA-IE Office, the agency has seized 75 containers of misdeclared and highly dutiable imports since the implementation last June 5 of the Soft Touch Enforcement Protocols, which uses lawfare as its main weapon, posted Cuyco at his Facebook account.
In fact, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. is beaming proudly over such a feat, which he credited to the close collaboration between DA-IE, Bureau of Customs and the DA bureaus. Since June 5, the DA-IE has issued 14 ALERT Requests (AR) to various ports. ALERT is acronym for Advice for Law Enforcement and Regulatory Tracking.
The DA-IE is headed by Undersecretary Carlos Carag.
‘Under the law, smuggling or hoarding of agricultural commodities is treated as economic sabotage if the value of the goods exceeds P10 million.’
ENFORCEMENT PROTOCOLS
The ARs basically invoke the prior inspection and examination (PIE) by DA rule pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Food Safety Act of 2013 (RA10611), and alert Customs authorities to hold and desist from clearing alerted agricultural and fishery (A/F) goods until they have been subjected to the PIE Rule by the One DA Border Control Team (1DABCT) together with the DA-IE Monitors, he explained.
Under the Food Safety Act of 2013, a special law covering agricultural and fishery commodities, the PIE is directed to be conducted before the tariff assessment by the Bureau of Customs (BOC). The PIE is the onset of the soft touch enforcement protocols (STEP) of the DA.
The STEP, unlike the Hard Action and Reaction Display (HARD) Protocol, does not need police actions like raiding warehouses and cold storage facilities.
STEP simply demands submission of import documents from the importers and their brokers.
MISDECLARED
The 75 containers were declared as processed goods like egg noodles, crab sticks and non dairy products, purposely to evade the quizzical prowling of the port-based operatives of the DA-IE.
However, these contraband turned out to be misdeclared as they were found to be mackerels, onions, and other highly dutiable and strictly regulated agri-fishery commodities.
Under the new law, the TRAs of the DA are empowered to declare misclassification and misdeclaration as may be found in violation of their import clearances. Most of these 75 containers did not even have import permits.
Many more spare magazines are included in the DA-IE AGRIForcement kit, among them is bringing to the attention of the Office of the President uncooperative government agencies and their officials.
MINIMIZING SMUGGLING
There is hope that smuggling could be minimized, if not eradicated, using the strategies of DA-IE, said Cuyco. “Perhaps, we can even look forward to some big fish to be apprehended, charged and penalized (hopefully with jail term) to serve as a deterrent to the rampant smuggling, price manipulation, hoarding and cartelized operations of unscrupulous importers, dealers and traders who do not only disadvantage the farmers but also the consumers with their malpractices.”
The smuggled items worth P34 million were seized at the Port of Manila, which could trigger a case for Anti-Agricultural Economic Sabotage Act, the DA press release said.
Upon inspection the three seized containers had 74 metric tons of fresh red onions worth P10.3 million, one yellow onion worth P3.82 million and the two containers had frozen mackerel worth P13 million and P20 million. “We intend to use the full force of the Anti-Agricultural Economic Sabotage Act against these companies, including those who may have hired them to ship these onions and fish,” Laurel said.
ECONOMIC SABOTAGE
Under the law, smuggling or hoarding of agricultural commodities is treated as economic sabotage if the value of the goods exceeds P10 million.
Customs Assistant Commissioner Vincent Philip Maronilla said that smugglers use a “scheme” where they would declare items as processed food under the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) jurisdiction.
“What they do is add a layer, thinking that our risk management system will just tag them for normal examination and the content underneath won’t be inspected,” Maronilla said.