site.btaCustoms Agency Prepares Systems for Euro Adoption

Preparations for the introduction of the euro in Bulgaria continue. On Friday it transpired that the Finance Ministry is confident in meeting the inflation criterion for joining the euro area and there are plans to formally request that the European Commission and the European Central Bank prepare extraordinary Convergence Reports.

The Bulgarian customs administration is also part of the process of preparation for our entry into the single currency union. The plan for adapting the information systems of the Customs Agency (CA) to work with the euro includes 16 CA information systems as well as five other systems whose copyrights are not owned by CA. 

By the end of last year, eight customs systems adapted to work with the euro had successfully passed test trials, the Customs Agency told BTA. The plan they are working on was drawn up in connection with the plan adopted by the Council of Ministers in 2023.  

In order to build integrated border management, to increase the efficiency of border control, increase the throughput of border checkpoints, to facilitate legitimate business and relieve citizens, the Customs administration has worked on eleven priority IT projects in the past year to upgrade existing and build new information systems of the Customs Agency.

In order to meet the requirements at European and national level, the Customs Agency plans to implement IT projects for upgrading the Agency's information systems in the medium and long term. 

The benefits for citizens and businesses from the modernisation of the systems are related to increased security and safety of goods entering the European market, prevention of various illegal practices, speeding up the work of legitimate businesses whose cargo will be processed faster and with less formalities, unification of procedures across Member States. The benefits for the administration are related to more possibilities to analyse large volumes of information, faster systems and better connectivity at EU level. 

To finance the implementation of ICT projects, the Customs Agency said it uses funds from operational programmes under the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIFs) and international programmes. In the period 2015 to 2023, 95% of the funds for software development were provided by the ESIFs and only 5% by the national budget. 

As a result of the development of various new tools and systems, it is expected that by 2032, the average processing time per vehicle at border crossings will be less than 5 minutes, the average time to release a shipment will be less than 30 minutes, and the customs clearance process will be fully automated.