Bonner, Danet stump for international security standards
As many as three dozen countries may be prepared to quickly endorse and implement a common set of global cargo security standards and simplified customs procedures established in a multilateral agreement expected to be adopted by the World Customs Organization at its annual meeting next month in Brussels, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert Bonner said Tuesday in a couple of appearances in New York to drum up support for the effort.
Bonner, who has been a driving force for common customs practices that can streamline regulatory requirements and increase security for companies engaged in international trade, stopped short of a prediction in a speech to the American Association of Importers and Exporters’ annual conference, but said it was important that two or three dozen countries sign up to implement the framework principles in order to quickly achieve a “critical mass” of countries that count on each other to conduct inspections, share similar cargo-related data and vet the supply chain security practices of companies in a reciprocal manner.
At a press conference earlier in the day, Bonner suggested that “perhaps a couple dozen countries” were prepared to implement the standards to the best of their ability.
WCO Secretary General Michel Danet expressed confidence that the WCO Council would approve the framework agreement during its June 23-24 meeting and said the effort will gain momentum if, as expected, some large members such as the United States, Australia, the European Union and Japan announce their intention to implement the supply chain security measures. There are 13 member customs administrations on the High-Level Strategic Group that has drafted the framework agreement and industry observers expect those nations to form the initial core of the cooperative customs effort.
Bonner and Danet said they hoped that developing countries will also implement the common set of customs practices. The WCO recognizes that some countries will need assistance modernizing their customs systems to meet the demands for more efficient and secure processing of cargo, they said. Countries can implement those parts of the framework that they can and seek assistance to build their capacity for technology and training that will allow them to automate cargo screening and processing.
Bonner said developed countries will work with Danet to match those countries that have expressed the political will to implement the framework with necessary capabilities.
The framework “has the right set of incentives that I think we’ll have a significant number of countries that join reasonably soon” after the WCO vote, Bonner said.
The incentives come in the form of funding and expertise to help countries build their capacity to quickly, efficiently and fairly process high volumes of cargo. A key part of the framework is that countries will use advance electronic cargo information to conduct risk-analysis and target potentially dangerous shipments for closer inspection, and that countries will conduct outbound inspections of high-risk cargo at the request of the importing nation using non-intrusive detection equipment such as large-scale X-ray machines and radiation detectors.
Bonner and Danet said many countries are ready to help with capacity-building efforts, but would only sponsor concrete projects that have been clearly identified in advance in order to prevent waste and abuse. Danet added that some large U.S. corporations are ready to help fund some capacity-building projects. In the past Bonner has suggested that the United States might approach the World Bank to help fund projects.
“I think there will be significant funding for capacity building, but it is going to be closely linked with both the political will and the actual carrying out of the framework,” Bonner said. Assistance will be tightly conditioned to actual training in security and risk management, detection equipment and computer technology, and infrastructure projects in countries that show a genuine commitment to modernize, and not be doled out as general assistance, he emphasized at the press conference.
CBP has already assigned a CBP officer to Brussels to work with the WCO’s newly established directorate for capacity building, and has established a new capacity building division within CBP’s Office of International Affairs to assist Danet in providing the training and systems needed to support customs reforms in many countries, Bonner announced at AAEI.
The Bonner-Danet tag team challenged AAEI members and their trading partners to press their governments to implement the framework standards because of the enormous benefits they gain from having to comply with one set of data standards and the predictability of the customs clearance process.
“I’d like to ask all of you to discuss the framework with your CEOs, your board of directors and contacts around the world, and I’d like to encourage the trade to establish links with their governments to push for implementation,” Bonner told the AAEI audience.
Danet said his “best ally” is the trade community because “businesses all around the world understand that we are designing a new relationship with customs administrations.”
The goal of the framework is to move customs agencies away from bureaucratic processing and sometimes adversarial relationships with importers and exporters. U.S. companies have a healthy dialogue with CBP and work cooperatively to solve differences related to security and duty collection, “but in many countries trade is totally excluded from these discussions,” Danet said.
“In some countries the trade is considered the same as the devil,” he added.
The reforms, which are based on programs in countries with advanced systems for customs processing such as the United States, Sweden, and Australia, will improve the exchange of information between states and the private sector and speed the movement of goods, Danet emphasized.
“I am convinced that developing countries that will adopt the framework, that will implement the capacity-building measures will see their trade increase, their fraud go down and their customs revenue will go up,” Danet told reporters.
Danet, who has been on a six-month barnstorming tour to build support among customs agencies and the private sector, recently returned from Moscow, where he said Russian businesses committed to help the WCO because they want better relations with Russian Customs.
“You can see the beginning of a dialogue there between customs and the private sector,” he said.
Danet will soon travel to Senegal, where there is little interaction between business and customs officials, to meet with African business leaders.
“I’m pretty sure that after my intervention in Dakar that all the African businesses will look at their governments and tell them you need to reform your customs administrations” for the good of the economy and African trade, Danet said. He will also meet in the coming days with private sector chiefs in the Baltic states.
“Customs organizations that join the framework will become facilitators of trade, not drags on trade,” Bonner told AAEI.