Belarusian Customs

Belarusian Customs

The creation of the Customs Service of the Republic of Belarus in 1991was an important step taken by the Belarusian government. But in spite of its adolescence customs service on the territory of Belarus has a more than one thousand-year history. The period between the 6-th and the 8-th century included the origin of the customs affairs on ancient Belarusian lands. The period of the 9-th-13-th century was marked by the formation and development of customs affairs and its legislation in Belarusian princedoms in terms of feudal disunity. Some unique geographic specialities of the location of Belarusian lands were revealed during this period. The Amber way lay through the territory of Belarusian lands where amber was sold. There was also the great way from Varangians to Greeks. Presumably, the first Customs   that were called “mytnizy” appeared in the 9-th century. They were located near bridges, river crossings, in the cities close to the main trade ways. Taxes and duties were taken by the so-called “mytniky”. It came from the word “myto”. The words «myto» and «myt» were mentioned for the first time in the agreement between Kievan Rus and Byzantine Empire in 905. These words had the same meaning as today’s customs duty. There were different kinds of myto, among them there were “dry” myto that was taken from carrigies and “water” myto that was used for boats.

The next period is the one of the establishment and development of Customs affairs within the territory of the Great Principality of Lithuania starting from the moment of its formation and ending after the signing of the Lublin union with the Poland Kingdom. In the Great Principality of Lithuania the System of customs duties was in competence of the governmental treasury – Scarb,  in charge of which there was a Podskarbiy zemskiy. 11 customs regions were formed there. Every customs had a special box that saved all the money duties. Three Statutes of GPL were laid down at this time. The Statutes of 1566 played the most significant role and in 1588 standard measurements of weight, volume and length were set up. Statutes also implied norms that prohibited importation of some goods, such as military weapon for example. There is one more valuable source of customs law related to this period. It is Metryka of GPL that concerned different customs issues (documents for rent, instructions and privileges).

The period of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is perfectly shown through the customs books that have been saved since the 18-th century, where the process of taking duties by customs officers was described. The customs system was increasingly transformed. Instead of the 11 customs regions there were just three of them. This was determined by the growing influence of St. Petersburg that covered almost all important trade ways. In the Poland-Lithuania Commonwealth the united General Zlo was introduced. It set up duties of different rates depending on the kind and the price of goods. The next period in the history of customs is the years of 1772-95 – 1850 when the territory of modern Belarus became a part of the Russian empire. This period is marked with the strong policy of protectionism. It lasted almost for 100 years. Every tsar of Russian Empire approved laws limiting the import of foreign goods and defending Russian products so these laws were spread within the territory of modern Belarus as well. During the Soviet period foreign trade was strictly monopolized and customs neither had any significant functions in the economy nor played any important roles. But it’s possible to have some idea of the Soviet customs system with the help of Customs Statutes of the USSR that were put into power in 1924 and 1928.

Today Customs is carrying out larger range of functions: fiscal function, regulation of foreign trade by means of tariff and non-tariff methods, law enforcement, keeping out a contraband, collection and keeping customs statistics concerning foreign trade.

When speaking about modern history of Belarusian Customs, it is necessary to say that the State customs committee of the Republic of Belarus was created in 1991. Minsk customs was one of the first customs offices. It was created in 1992. This period is signified by acceptance of the Customs Code in 1993. Many customs points were equipped and supplied with necessary technical facilities, customs infrastructure is developing fast as well. Since then the number of customs offices has changed a lot, for example in 1993 there were 20 customs and today we have only 9 of them as  the program “one region – one customs” is functioning in Belarus nowadays. The customs forms a large part of national budget, today it’s near 50%. BC is keeping pace with new technologies and it helps to facilitate the process of going through the customs. Belarus joined the Kyioto convention in the context of WCO that implies simplification and acceleration of customs procedures.

Since 2010 BC has been working in cooperation with Russian and Kazakhstanish customs within the framework of the Customs Union. It became possible with the creation of a system of customs regulation in the Customs Union of the Republic of Belarus, the Republic of Kazkahstan and the Russian Federation. The activity of uniform legislation has been held since then. The Customs Union provides economic security and customs sovereignty, intensifying economic relations of the Member States of the customs union with the world economy, the protection of the rights of citizens and economic interests, as well as their compliance with the obligations in the area of customs regulation of trade across the customs border of the Customs Union.

Summing up Belarus has a modern, multi-functioning Customs Service which is able to take a deserving place in market economy regulation.