On the sidelines of the 6th Global Review of Aid for Trade, hosted from 11 to 13 July at the WTO in Geneva, the Secretary General of the WCO met with the Director-General of the WTO to discuss topics of mutual interest in the specific context of implementation of the WTO TFA.
The WCO Secretary General started by congratulating WTO Director-General on the entry into force of the TFA and informed him that a Communiqué had been issued following last week’s WCO Council Sessions. The Communiqué places particular emphasis on the entry into force of the TFA and the importance of National Committees on Trade Facilitation (NCTFs) for cooperation and coordination among all relevant stakeholders. It also urges other border agencies to inform NCTFs of their readiness to implement the TFA provisions and identify requirements, as this will enable Members to finalise their notifications to the WTO and will expedite the provision of technical assistance and capacity building as a result. NCTFs will play an important role in implementing Coordinated Border Management, including Single Window projects, and identifying bottlenecks using the Time Release Study.
The WTO Director-General welcomed the WCO’s offer to support the newly established WTO Trade Facilitation Committee and expressed his hope for close cooperation in this respect.
The WCO Director-General explained that the WCO was well positioned to support TFA implementation by sharing Members’ practices as a first step, based on which it can develop guidelines and standards. One such area is transit, for which Guidelines were launched earlier this week at the WCO Global Conference on Transit. Another such area will be special Customs regimes and zones, which the WCO is working on as part of the Economic Competitiveness Package Action Plan.
The topic of E-Commerce was also discussed, together with the way forward for future collaboration between the two Organisations. The WCO Secretary General informed the WTO about the work being carried out by the WCO in conjunction with new e-commerce supply chain actors, under the umbrella of the Working Group on E-Commerce. The objective of this work is to develop practical operational solutions for the cross-border movement of physical goods intended for consumers after online initiation. The work will allow WCO Members to address the challenges posed by the tremendous growth in e-commerce, including revenue leakage, safety, security and other risks.