Customs, BEAC seal deal to facilitate data sharing.

The Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, was signed Wednesday May 29. The Director General of Customs, Fongod Edwin Nuvaga, signed for his institution while the National Director of BEAC, Pierre Emmanuel Nkoa Ayissi, signed on behalf of the central bank.

The signing took place at the Directorate General of Customs. Officials said yesterday’s MoU sends a strong signal of a mutually beneficial partnership. The institutions will share data related to imports and exports.

Speaking at the event, Edwin Fongod said, the Customs department is resolutely committed to facilitating trade through the simplification, modernisation and lightening of import/export procedures.

These, he said, requires optimising the expected return through better management of financial flows covering foreign trade.

He further explained that sharing data from the Customs information system and financial transactions with the outside world from BEAC, will improve the monitoring of activities such as the domiciliation of foreign trade operations with approved intermediaries.

Other gains, the Customs DG, said the appropriation of the value of goods and services; monitoring the repatriation of export earnings; allocation of foreign exchange to travelers and discharge of remittances related to foreign trade.

The partnership, he also said, will help in combating money laundering and the terrorism financing in relation to foreign trade operations.

BEAC National Director indicated that the respective administrations are essential links in the supervision of the country's foreign trade.

Nkoa Ayissi remarked that: “The Customs and the Central Bank work to protect the national economy from insufficiently transparent, non-transparent or totally opaque cross-border operations. Pursuing the same goal, we must therefore work together”.

He reiterated that, BEAC and the Customs Department “have decided to join forces for the greater good of the country's economy and its economic operators”.

“This efficiency will also be reflected in a better understanding of the operations of those subject to the laws and regulations that govern our activities,” he added.

It is worth noting that since the implementation of the Foreign Exchange Regulations, the total number of foreign currency transactions transiting through BEAC is said to have increased by 60%.

Also, the level of repatriation of Cameroon's export earnings has risen from 2.271 billion FCFA in 2019 to 4.636 billion FCFA in 2022, an increase of 104%.

The country’s external reserves has equally spiked from 4.5 months in 2019 to 7 months of imports of goods and services, an overall increase of 56%.