GRA to extend CTN to airport, land ports

The Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has said it will soon extend the implementation of the Cargo Tracking Note (CTN) policy to all the entry points into the country.

The implementation started at the sea ports on Monday, 15 October 2018, despite a suit challenging its implementation.

Per the policy, importers whose imports, from records exceed thirty-six (36) Twenty-Foot Equivalent Units (TEUs) per year will be required to obtain a CTN Number in the country of export.

"This means, any importer who imports less than 36 TEUs per year is exempted from CTN-compliance. Further, businesses that import more than 36 TEUs per year but can demonstrate that the nature of their imports and their turnovers make them small importers, will be exempted," the notice said.

"Those exemptions are to ensure that our small- and medium-scale importers, mostly petty traders, our market women and men, small distributors, and other small to medium businesses, are free from the requirements of this intervention".

Speaking on this development on Ghana Yensom on Accra 100.5FM on Tuesday, October 16, hosted by Don Kwabena Prah Jr. (The Don), Revenue Officer at the GRA, Paakow Ekumah, who is also the officer in charge of Communications and Public Affairs at the GRA, said the authority intends to widen the tax net to cover all the entry points into the country.

“After the seaport, we'll be looking at the airport and land port. We are roping in everybody,” he said.

Mr Ekumah added: “We're not only focusing on the seaport, we'll widen the tax net and we're sensitising all the people on this policy.”

Touching on the lawsuit, he explained that they received the lawsuit against the implementation of the policy over the weekend, "but it is something I cannot talk about for now.”