KCCI hosts event to raise awareness about PSW

KARACHI: The Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) organised a session on Pakistan Single Window (PSW) to raise technical awareness about its operations, a statement said on Tuesday.

The session raised technical awareness about the overall operations of this important facility and provided an opportunity to the participants of the session to better understand the system, highlight issues and get adequate response along with first-hand information from the relevant officers of Pakistan Customs.

Customs chief domain officer Naveed Abbas Memon said that the PSW portal has been designed to fully facilitate traders by reducing time, cost and complexity in cross border trade in addition to improving the quality of experience for all stakeholders.

It also supports other government departments in adopting an Integrated Risk Management (IRM) approach for efficient enforcement of trade related controls, he added.

Earlier, while welcoming the participants of the awareness session, KCCI president Muhammad Idrees appreciated the PSW initiative introduced by the government which would certainly help in minimising human interaction and reduce chances of harassment and corruption.

However, the KCCI president stressed the need to promptly rectify numerous glitches in the system and simplify procedures in order to achieve the prime objective of the PSW facility which was to ensure ease of doing business.

Idress was of the view that fully functional and totally flawless operations of PSW would also enable Pakistan to achieve compliance with WTO’s Trade Facilitation Agreement besides helping Pakistan to unlock its potential in becoming a hub for trade.

He noted that Karachi Chamber is the first Chamber of the country to NADRA e-Sahulat at KCCI premises, where members of the business and industrial community were being provided biometric verification facility required for registration in the PSW portal.

“PSW or any other IT-enabled service to be introduced in future must be devised in such a manner that these facilitate business community rather than becoming a source for exploitation”, he stressed, adding that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) must work in close coordination with the KCCI to make PSW and other such future initiatives successful.

The session, which was steered by chief domain officer and additional collector Customs Naveed Abbas Memon and simultaneously conducted through online zoom facility, was attended by KCCI president Muhammad Idrees, senior vice president Abdul Rehman Naqi, vice president Qazi Zahid Hussain, Customs and Valuations Subcommittee chairman Muhammad Arif Lakhani.

Former senior vice president Muhammad Ibrahim Kasumbi, former vice president Nasir Mehmood, KCCI Managing Committee and General Body members participated, in addition to more than 250 people from all over the country including Sialkot, Lahore, Islamabad and Faisalabad who joined the meeting via zoom facility.

Many participants of the meeting expressed deep concerns over some non-functional tabs in the PSW portal and the delays in biometric verification for registration which was causing demurrage detention losses.