Exploring the Customs System of Free Trade Port Area in Taiwan

• Main Authors: Hu-Min Chang, 張護民
• Other Authors: Chiu, Rong-Her
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2014
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/65534n

碩士 === 國立臺灣海洋大學 === 航運管理學系 === 102 === Beginning from 1960s, Taiwan government launched the export processing zone to increase domestic employment and promote economic development. Since 1980s, the science park was established to accelerate the transformation of agrarian society. These planned projects made huge contribution to national economic development and brilliant record of the economy and the GDP of Taiwan. At that time, Taiwan also rose to the first of the four Asian Tigers and entered into the list of developing countries. Facing the trend of free trade in globalized economy, Taiwan government passed the Act for the Establishment and Management of Free Trade Zones (FTZ) in 2003 with the hope to make a great step forward for the nation’s economy. The scale has be increased from the original 4 harbor-based and one airport-based to 5 harbor-based and one airport-based FTZs; it further expanded to 6 harbor-based and one airport-based in 3013 and the business performance also continued increasing. Since 2014, the government again promoted to establish the free economic pilot zones to re-create its economic miracles. This study discovers that operators consider the current major issues of customs control in FTZs are: (1) the regulation has been too tight for false declaration of goods which caused operator’s great difficulty for operations; (2) the administrative discretion of Customs officers is sometimes different and the system about the fine on minor offense need to be establish; (3) the account book management required by Customs has been too complicated; (4) the check items have been too trivial which will block the free flow of goods within FTZs; (5) the requirement of concrete wall between warehouse of importing and exporting cargoes is not necessary; (6) the ratio for inspecting cargoes of mini-three-link trade is too high; (7) the procedures for transporting cargoes in/out FTZs are too complicated; (8) the Customs requires cargoes cannot be moved across different FTZs is not reasonable; and (9) the regulation is too strict on monitoring the business activities within FTZs. To improve the problems, this research suggests the following points: (1) Taiwan should join in regional economic integrated system and its Customs control system need more deregulated; (2) within the FTZs, there is a need to establish a vertical and horizontal communication mechanism; (3) Customs agency needs enhance the risk managerial system and reduce procedures control; (4) considering to set up an information integration platform between sea transport and Customs authorities; and (5) trying to integrate and simplify Customs regulations. Keywords: Free trade zone, Customs system, Within national territory but outside customs territory, Global logistics management, Authorized economic operator