On 1 January the World Customs Organisation (WCO) announced the 30th anniversary of the Harmonised System (HS), which it considers ‘the universal language for international trade’.
The HS allows a world of many languages to speak with one. A multipurpose nomenclature for trade, the HS is one of the most successful instruments developed by the WCO. Its Convention has 156 Contracting Parties and the HS is used by more than 200 countries, territories and Customs or Economic Unions. It forms the basis for Customs tariffs and statistical nomenclatures around the world, and is used for around 98% of world trade. The year 2018 marks the 30th Anniversary of the HS which came into effect on 1 January, 1988.
As an international standard with global application, the HS plays a key role in facilitating world trade. The HS is used as the basis for: (i) Customs tariffs; (ii) Trade policies and quota controls; (iii) Collection of international trade statistics and data exchange; (iv) Rules of origin; (v) Trade negotiations such as the WTO Information Technology Agreement and Free Trade Agreements (FTAs); (vi) Monitoring of controlled goods, for example chemical weapons precursors, hazardous wastes and persistent organic pollutants, ozone depleting substances and endangered species; and (vii) Many Customs controls and procedures, including risk assessments and profiling, electronic data input and matching and compliance activities; and Economic research and analysis.
According the WCO the HS is crucial to the development of global trade. It is also fundamental to achieving fair, efficient and effective revenue collection, a primary Strategic Goal of the WCO. In addition, as it provides an essential tool for the simplification and harmonisation of customs procedures and provides the basis of knowing what trade goods are crossing borders, it contributes to other major strategic goals of Customs administrations and of the WCO.
The HS is now in its 6th edition and the WCO is in the process of preparing the 7th Edition of the HS (HS 2022). During the life of the HS, there have been 60 meetings of the Harmonised System Committee (HSC) where 4 144 agenda items were discussed, 10 recommendations were produced concerning the application of the HS Convention, 2280 classification decisions made and 871 Classification Opinions adopted to ensure the harmonisation of classification.
On the occasion of this anniversary, the WCO called for the international Customs community, in partnership with the international trade community, to continue to be proactive and pursue its efforts to develop and maintain the HS, especially in terms of the application and uniform interpretation of the HS, so as to safeguard and further grow the benefits of this success.
