Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan traveled to Gyumri, where he first called at the State Revenue Committee’s Northern Foreign Economic Service Center to get acquainted with the ongoing construction activities. SRC Chairman Davit Ananyan reported that the Center’s primary function will be to provide customs clearance for imported vehicles.

Large-scale construction is underway on the 6 hectare site for customs clearance of cars from the 21.5 hectares of land allocated for the construction of a GC service center in Gyumri. It was reported that a section of the center which will focus on the functions of the automobile business will be put into operation in early November, 2019. The building will be equipped with state-of-the-art equipment and innovative solutions that will provide citizens and businesses with high quality services.

The Gyumri car park will also provide one-stop-shop services. That is to say, not only customs clearance but also registration of vehicles and obtaining a state license will be carried out there. Given the expected volume of car imports, 800-1000 cars will be cleared daily here

The transfer of customs operations of cars imported to Armenia will be organized step by step. The process of customs clearance of some groups of cars started at the Northern Customs House in Gyumri as early as on October 14. This refers, in particular, to the customs clearance of light passenger cars of Group 8703 imported from Georgia and Japan to Armenia exclusively in the Commodity Nomenclature of External Economic Activity, with the exception of cars transported in containers. (However, if the cars cross the border into the Armenian-Iranian sector, the customs clearance is carried out at the South Customs House in Sisian).

The second stage, which starts on October 21, the Northern Customs Department of Gyumri will be designated as the customs authority of destination when filling in the TTIM type declaration for cars imported into the Republic of Armenia through the Armenian-Georgian border, provided they are not transported by truck or container, regardless of the country of export. The customs clearance of other means of transport will continue to be carried out in a decentralized manner at the customs-preferred department of the applicant.

A number of measures have been taken to improve the quality of services and organize work more effectively. As a result, 350-400 cars shall be serviced daily in the Northern Customs Department. The whole process of customs clearance is supposed to take 20 minutes.

The Northern Customs Department has new trained personnel. The process is organized through 3 divisions within the unit. In the meantime, the Sisian customs will continue to operate for vehicles entering the southern border.

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The founding of the Northern Foreign Economic Service Center in Gyumri stems from the SRC’s 2020-2024 Strategic Development and Administration Program. The goal is to create an EGP-operated Customer Service Center based on e-government systems and digital solutions to facilitate custom operations and increase efficiency, deliver more quality and up-to-date services.

On August 1, the Government approved the draft submitted by the State Revenue Committee to allocate 21.5 hectares of land for the construction of the center. Earlier the Prime Minister had instructed to submit a proposal to move the customs clearance function to Gyumri. In the meantime, the SRC has elaborated and, following approval, included a comprehensive 5-year strategic plan for the Committee to build a GSE service center in Gyumri, which will fully implement the vehicle customs clearance function.

The center is 158 km from Bagratashen customs checkpoint, 115 km from Gogavan and 58 km from Bavra. These are the three customs checkpoints in northern Armenia, where most of the imports and exports are carried out.

The SRC Strategic Development Program envisages building two service centers for external economic activity in Armenia within three years. The SIS in South and Gyumri in the Northern EAZ will further focus on all state-level external economic activity functions in a single window.

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Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan participated in the Strategic Planning Workshop organized by the State Revenue Committee in Gyumri.

SRC Chairman David Ananyan, Head of EU Delegation to Armenia Andrea Victor, and UNDP Resident Representative in Armenia Dmitry Mariasin attended and addressed the event.

Welcoming the participants of the workshop, the Prime Minister noted that one of the main issues in the context of the development of our statehood was the lack of high quality sector strategies and lack of sufficient level of interconnection with other existing sector strategies.

“Our government has set a goal for us to put in place strategies that will result in short, medium and long-term strategies. I am glad that the State Revenue Committee has been steadily moving in this direction.

I would like to point out that, in general, I am satisfied with the work of the SRC and would like to state that the SRC has resolved my problems in macro-level, but there are still many issues to be resolved in micro-level. In this regard, the adoption of the strategy is important for the implementation of solutions,” Nikol Pashinyan said.

According to the Prime Minister, strategy is understood to mean administration, improvement of procedures, service delivery. “The SRC’s task is to change the attitude of the citizen towards his / her taxes, tax liabilities, but it should be noted that for this purpose SRC employees must change their attitude towards their work and change their attitude in their contacts with citizens.

This is a two-way process and it It should take place under the auspices of the government, and the government should encourage citizens and SRC employees to make these changes.

At the same time, I consider it important for citizens to clearly state that the money they pay to the state through the SRC, they pay for themselves, they pay for their country, our country, infrastructure, services and education.

You should agree that it would be strange if every citizen built their own way, school, state institution for himself. The taxes they pay are invested in their own future, the future of their own children.

In order for this perception to reach its peak, it is crucial that there is a qualitative change in the tax and customs spheres and a qualitative change in the work of the government in general. How much citizens pay taxes depends in large part on how those taxes are spent,” Nikol Pashinyan said.

The Prime Minister emphasized that the government considers the fight against corruption in particular tax and customs important, but also recognizes that besides political will to solve this problem it is necessary to go for other solutions, including continuous salary increases.

“But this must inevitably be followed by a continuing increase in the professional level of tax and customs officials. Of course, it is a priority for us to bring forward the qualitative changes, because they are the factors that will legitimize the increase in salaries for the government and the public, and we must go that way,” he said.

The Premier wished the workshop successful proceedings, as well as progress and new achievements to the State Revenue Committee and the Government in dealing with the aforementioned issues.

“We are talking not only about the quality of services we will provide, but also about the capital investment opportunities we have and how they will stimulate economic growth so that our state revenues grow each year.

Of course, the fight against shadow is not on our agenda in any way, we have had unprecedented achievements in this regard, but I would also like to emphasize that I do not consider these successes to be the most and we must consistently go this way, constantly increasing the tax-GDP ratio.

The promotion of economic activity should be a priority, which has not only the financial but also psychological component and the mood and disposition of business entities is largely conditioned by the cooperation with the tax and customs authorities. I am sure that this quality will increase and I encourage all of you to move that way clearly and unambiguously,” Nikol Pashinyan concluded.

During the workshop, SRC Chairman Davit Ananyan delivered a presentation, entitled “The Road to SRC Modernization: Latest Developments.” SRC Advisor Aram Tananyan presented the modernization project of Meghri checkpoint and the establishment of a center for foreign economic activity in Gyumri.

The SRC 2020-2024 Strategic Development and Administration Plan was next presented during the workshop. The Strategy outlines the SRC’s key activity vectors and the reforms to be implemented over the next five years, the projects and the set of measures to facilitate their implementation, as well as their impact and forecasts on macroeconomic indicators.

The strategic measures will help boost efficiency in tax and customs administration through analytical tools, wider scope of services provided to taxpayers and technology-based optimization solutions.

The workshop was organized within the framework of the Assistance to Armenia in Migration and Border Management (MIBMA) project funded by the European Union and implemented in cooperation with the UN Development Program and the International Center for Migration Policy Development in Armenia.

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During his visit to Gyumri, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan laid the last piece of the puzzle in the painting referred to as “The Promised Sacrifice of Grandfather and Grandmother,” authored by Gyumri-based painter Susanna Mkrtchyan.

The Gyumri without Temporary Shelters Foundation, which is the initiator of the project, intends to purchase 2 or 3 apartments for homeless families with those 15 million drams that will be received from the sale of a puzzle consisting of 15 thousand pieces.

One piece of the puzzle is sold for 1000 drams. The puzzle is located on the wall of the Gyumri City Hall.