The Bureau of Customs (BoC) tallied more than P72 billion of recovered smuggled goods from January to October 2024, surpassing its accomplishment year-on-year.

During the BoC’s Inter-Agency Intelligence Summit on 16 October in Batangas, Customs Commissioner Bien Rubio reported to attendees, including Finance Secretary Ralph Recto, that the yields of recovered smuggled goods for its last three quarters’ 1,414 operations stood at P72.091 billion.

In October 2024 alone, the BOC seized P3.09 billion worth of smuggled goods, which included P2.3 billion worth of various commodities, P22.3 million worth of cigarettes, and a P402 million vessel carrying smuggled petroleum products.

There was also P42.16 million worth of illegal drugs intercepted at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport and P323 million worth of smuggled sacks of rice.

Noting that the accomplishments recorded so far this year are “a record-breaking feat in the history” of the BoC, Rubio expressed confidence that more will be accomplished in the coming years.

“This proves that our combined efforts are not only effective but essential in combating smuggling and other illicit activities,” he said.

 “In the face of increasingly complex threats, we must stand as a united front. With each of us having diverse expertise in the field of intelligence, we are allowed to achieve far more collectively than any agency could accomplish alone,” Commissioner Rubio maintained.

For his part, Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence Group Juvymax Uy said the summit creates a forum where key government agencies can come together and identify their strengths and weaknesses.

“The accumulation of knowledge and experience in intelligence operations through activities like this Intelligence Summit would enable us all to achieve an excellent resolution for dealing with trade facilitation, border protection, and all other customs cooperation programs,” the deputy commissioner said.

“May we maintain the partnership we have established and further strengthen the collaboration as may be necessitated by the circumstances,” Uy added.

Meanwhile, Secretary Recto described intelligence as the “vanguard” of law enforcement because reliable information meant that there would be no need to mobilize an armed group to stop the activities.

“And from a finance and budgetary point of view, it is an economical form of warfare, because good intelligence saves lives, disarms threats, defuses tensions, and stops conflicts and crimes from happening,” he said.

The DOF secretary likewise brought attention to the role of the BOC’s intelligence division in ensuring that traditional and modern methods are used in curbing smuggling activities.

“In the case of smuggling of goods, it is a crime that victimizes millions—from farmers who drown from the flood of imported agricultural products to entrepreneurs whose businesses are choked by unfair trade,” he said.