Financial Times - Issue of forged certifications of origin

According to recent news reports, consignments of cloves and arecanuts from Indonesia have gone to India on forged certificates of origin, purported to have been issued by the authorities in Sri Lanka, enabling the racketeers to clear the consignments in India on duty free basis under the Indo Sri Lanka Free Trade Agreement.

As a result of the stringent measures adopted by our Commerce Department some months back after joint meetings between the Department, the Customs and the Spices and Allied Products ‘ Producers and Traders’ Association (SAPPTA), certain far reaching decisions were taken leading to unscrupulous elements being unable to obtain origin certificates except for exports of indigenous products. This is because at those joint meetings, among other requirements laid down for obtaining certificates, the most important was that the consignments to be loaded on a vessel, shall have entered through the gates of the port of Colombo.

These restrictions have lead to the forging of certificates of origin and some culprits appear to have been caught as they had obtained consignments from Indonesia directly into India and as they were not able to obtain origin certificates from the Department of Commerce in Colombo (as the consignments had not been loaded in Colombo),they had resorted to forging the certificates.

SAPPTA is seeking a joint meeting with the Director General of the Department of Commerce and officials of the Customs in order to study how the loop holes can be blocked and a fool proof system introduced, in view of these new developments.