CROWN AGENTS: OUR MAIN PRIORITY IS THE SUSTAINABILITY OF REFORM IN THE BULGARIAN CUSTOMS AGENCY
Interview with Frank Ferguson, Principal Customs Advisor and Team Leader of Crown Agents’ Bulgarian Customs Modernisation Programme

Friday, 9th of June 2006
"Cash" Weekly

Mr. Ferguson, what is your appraisal of your work in Bulgaria?
Crown Agents is very mindful of the fact that the people we advise in Bulgaria’s Customs Agency (BCA) are very experienced. Our job is to contribute to the greater knowledge and experience of the personnel within the BCA and to bring our experience from other customs administrations and from an international environment. Crown Agents have worked on many similar contracts around the world but the readiness to embrace change in Bulgaria is as good as anywhere I have ever seen.

What are the biggest changes in the Customs since Crown Agents came to Bulgaria?
Crown Agents was employed from the very beginning to help raise customs revenues. The increase of customs revenue since our programme began in 2002 has been dramatic – it has more than doubled. Last year the BCA exceeded all records and brought in over 5 billion BGN. There are, of course, a number of factors involved but it is the view of Crown Agents that one of the biggest causes of the revenue uplift has been the increase in compliance by traders. This means the declaration of more realistic valuations on their goods and the declarations of accurate classifications. Crown Agents has also helped to devise and oversee the creation of an Intelligence and Investigation Directorate within the BCA, the establishment of an internal audit function as well as the introduction of standard procedures and guidelines for staff to follow.

How have you achieved your success?
The most visible part of our programme is the introduction of the customs mobile teams. They are multi-agency and include representatives form the BCA, the National Revenue Agency (NRA), the Ministry of Interior (MoI) Directorate for Combating Organised Crime and, of course, Crown Agents’ advisors. We have worked very closely with the BCA to develop a National Control and Coordination Unit which tasks the teams on the basis of risk-assessment. This control unit includes representative managers from each of the participating agencies. Each of these organisations brings their own skills and their own risk-assessment procedures. In very simple terms, from these people we get the best risk-assessment available, which helps us to choose the right targets for examination.

What is the main priority of your current work?
Our main aim is to leave a legacy of sustainability. We are currently identifying and training Bulgarian customs officers to be leaders of the mobile teams. By the end of the year all the 15 mobile teams will be lead by Bulgarian customs officers. We have also helped Bulgarian government representatives to explore the United Kingdom’s experience in combating threats to revenue collection, posed by the organised crime. At the invitation of the British Embassy in Sofia, a high-level Bulgarian delegation including the chairman of the Parliamentary anti-corruption committee, the deputy finance minister, Georgi Kadiev, the heads of the BCA, the NRA and the MoI Directorate for Combating Organised Crime, recently visited UK’s institutions engaged in this area. During this visit, Crown Agents organised a dedicated seminar whose aim was to identify the major threats to revenue collection in Bulgaria and to examine how these issues are addressed by the country’s existing control, enforcement and anticorruption agencies.