The WCO is among the impressive range of contributors from policy, enforcement and academic circles who contributed to the 2015 volume of the Palgrave Studies in Green Criminology, titled ‘Environmental Crime and Collaborative State Intervention.’ The book shed...
As part of the WCO Environment Programme, the WCO Secretariat is working to solidify the role of Customs in environmental matters. Customs administrations are regularly reminded of the importance of implementing the various environmental agreements in force, existing training material is updated ...
Illegal Wildlife Trade
A number of sub-Saharan African, Asian, and South American Customs administrations participating in the INAMA Project, which aims to enhance Customs’ capacity to counter wildlife trafficking by en...
Greening the HS is on the agenda, but how best to do it? To find answers to this question, the WCO is organizing a series of five symposia from October 2022 to January 2023. You may join the events either in-person, at the WCO headquarters in Brussels, or online vi...
To enable private and public stakeholders share their ideas and HS amendment proposals, the WCO Secretariat is organizing a series of symposia which will each look at a different area of the HS (see box). There are principles governing the creation or amendment of a provision in the HS, and how t...
The global Customs theme for 2020 reads “Customs Fostering Sustainability for People, Prosperity and the Planet,” and, although the three focus areas are inter-linked, each warrants separate consideration due to their wide-ranging scope.
It is thought-provoking to note that global GDP ...
Sustainable Development Goals
World leaders committed, for the first time, to the goal of sustainable development at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. In 2000, 189 States signed a declaration to achieve eight Mi...
Environmental sustainability
Environmental sustainability lies at the heart of most of the SDGs, and cannot be detached from the SDGs and future prosperity. The UN acknowledges environmental sustainability as key to achie...
Working towards environmental sustainability
Various environmental and social treaties and goals have been adopted internationally, but more progress has been made in relation to social goals than environmental ones.
Conclusion It is imperative for Customs administrations to acknowledge and respond to environmental risks and crimes, and to ensure that such crimes receive the strategic and policy recognition and operational attention t...
The National Board of Trade Sweden recently published a report entitled Trade and Climate Change – Promoting c...
Ongoing discussions related to the trade liberalization of environmental and climate-friendly goods
Trade and the environment has been a long-standing topic in the WTO, and various – so far unsuccessful – attempts have been made to li...
Environmentally preferable products
As mentioned above, another issue in previous negotiations has been whether to include so-called “environmentally preferable products...
The global trade in illegal pesticides is growing, evidenced by the increase in the number of seizures and incidents around the world related to such products. The increase is not only due to better awareness by controlling authorities of the phenomenon, but also to the fact that nowadays the ill...
In pursuance of the WCO’s objective to support global sustainability efforts, its Secretariat recently conducted a survey among Customs administrations to ascertain their level of engagement with regards to the implementation of Multilateral Environmental Agreements, or MEAs, as they are common...
Findings
Importance given to MEAs
Customs administrations were asked to rate the importance they attached to the implementation of each of the eight MEAs in their countries. Th...
How the Harmonized System supports a safer, greener world by specifying goods of environmental concern or interest.
“Here be dragons”
Dragons and other mythological beasts...
Goods posing environmental risks
In every new edition of the HS, there are changes designed to make it simpler for administrations to monitor and control the trade in goods posing an environmental risk. For example, goods...
Good trade-related policy requires good trade data.
While it may occasionally be necessary to implement policies and trade measures without a data-driven understanding of the underlying trade, there is always the risk that doing so could deliver unpredictable results or miss the desired ob...
There is a lot of trade in this commodity – why doesn’t it have its own HS Code?
Every good is classified, but not all goods are specified by name in their own HS code. The question of the varying levels of specificity around goods ...
Why is country x classifying this item differently from country y?
One question that arose frequently during the early days of the pandemic was why differen...
Here are the points worth considering.
A clear rationale – the “Why”
Why would this proposal represent a good use of an HS code? There are millions of products, but there is limited capacity in a usable Customs nomenclature w...
There is a long-standing concern that trade flows in hazardous and other wastes could lead to negative impacts on human health and the environment if such wastes end up in countries without capacities for their proper management. On the other hand, trade in was...
Latest developments
In May 2019, the Conference of the Parties to the Basel Convention, the Convention’s decision-making body, adopted numerous decisions. They include the adoption of the Plastic Wastes Amendments, whic...
The environmentally sound management of wastes covered under the Convention also has its own specificities and implementation challenges. First of all, the definition and classification of waste, scrap and secondary materials can be different from country to country. The Convention specifies haza...
Available support
Fourteen regional centres for training and technology transfers related to the management of hazardous wastes and other wastes and the minimization of their generation have been established to support th...
This article looks at how Singapore Customs strives to bring efficiency in the management of trade operations to lower their impact on the environment as well as at the initiatives it has taken to support environmental policies.
The most fre...
What about trade?
Singapore being one of Asia’s largest trading hubs, readers may ask “What about international trade and transport-related emissions?” The Maritime ...
Lessening the impact of our activities
The creation, processing, storage and movement of data rely extensively on finite resources: electricity, water, metals, chemicals and manmade materials, such as plastics and glass. ...
The ozone layer, which lies in the atmosphere high above our heads, is vital for protecting human health and the environment from dangerous ultraviolet radiation reaching the earth’s surface. Without it, life on earth could not exist. Depletion of this thin layer of gas is caused by the emissio...
Montreal Protocol
This environmental success story is testament to the achievements of the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, under which nations of the world have phased-out 99% of ODS. One may conclude, therefore, that a global environmental ca...
Numerous media outlets often publish alarming articles about the dire state of the environment, but is this really the case? The answer to this is, unfortunately, an unambiguous YES!
Even rudimentary research substantiates that the environment, in all its facets, is deplorably under severe...
In the last decade Uruguay experienced a true energy revolution. Back at the turn of the century oil accounted for 27% of Uruguay’s imports and a new pipeline was just about to begin supplying gas from Argentina. Today hydroelectric, biomass, solar and wind power plants provide 94.5% of the cou...
It also worked to resolve the logistical problems posed by the size and weight of some of the goods involved. In particular, it provided importers with specially rearranged premises to allow for the storage of such goods at the port and reviewed the working hours of customs officials.
In a...
The global demand for timber, and its products, is only partly being met from legal sources. According to a 2012 Legal framework One of the key global agreements is the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) that came into force in 1975. CITES, which has 183 signature countries, aims ... Organizations such as the WCO, working with its partners like INTERPOL, are investing a great deal in fostering collaboration among Customs administrations and relevant enforcement bodies to curb the illicit trade in various commodities, including through enforcement operations. One of these,
Results and remaining challenges Data collected by the UNEP’s World Conservation Monitoring Centre...
The Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer has been in the news a great deal recently. This is something quite unusual for a ‘lesser known’ convention. But how has this landmark environmental treaty, which some see as the most successful international agreement ...
Interview with Ms Louise van Greunen, Director, Building Respect for IP Division, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and Dr Martin Guard, Chartered Environmentalist and Hazardous Waste Specialist
What must be taken into account before storing IP-infringing goods, and who is liable for storage costs? Dr Martin Guard: Storage of IP-infringing goods can be both complex and expensive. Firstly, IP-in...
Studies have shown that the air mode has become a sought-after transport avenue for criminals wishing to move illicit wildlife products from one country to another. Not only is air transport fast and convenient, it also allows large consignments to be broken up into smaller ones, thereby reducing...
Questionnaire
In order to carry out the assessments, experts developed a model questionnaire that was tested during two assessments which took place in 2016. The model drew on existing tools dealing with similar issues,...
Countering the illegal trade in waste in electrical and electronic equipment, also known as e-waste or by the acronym WEEE, is a challenging, and actual topic for governments, industries, and academics alike. Human health and safety issues, environmental protection...
It is estimated that the world population has surpassed 7.4 billion, generating over 10 billion tonnes of varying types of waste per year. Waste can be traded at international level as long as commercial transactions are in compliance with the rules set by the Basel Convention on the Control of T...
Fewer seizures
Data show a decline in waste imports following the entry into force of the ban: there were 13.49 million tonnes of solid waste imported into China in 2019, representing a 39.8% decline compared with 2018. M...
The need to dispose of or destroy goods that infringe intellectual property (IP) rights in an appropriate, environmentally safe manner, in line with the applicable environmental and public health legislation, has been highlighted at various WCO meetings as well as in this In 2021, Dubai Customs made around 390 seizures totalling 1,764,710 counterfeit items – a big jump from the 1,906 counterfeit items seized in 2020. The fake products ranged from computers to athletic shoes, timepieces, mobile phone accessories, headphones, garments, bags and cosmetics. All of t... Fresh impetus The new procedure is set to give fresh impetus to the cooperation between right holders and Dubai Customs. The latter regularly organize training events in cooperation with the right holders of major brands,...
According to the United Nations Environment Programme, the continent of Asia is the world’s largest dumping ground for illegally traded waste. The region also grapples with the enormous amount of plastic waste it generates on its own, which has already wreaked havoc on local ecosystems. In fact...
Scale of the issue
A growing number of waste shipments reach the Philippines each year. Some contain legitimate waste that can be recycled, but others are made up of garbage and general household trash fit only for incine...
Global warming is on a dangerous trajectory. Human-induced carbon dioxide pollution and deforestation are steadily increasing levels of atmospheric CO2 concentration which is resulting in, among other things, higher global average temperatures and extrem...
Imagine being less than two feet tall and having to navigate the luggage carousel at one of the busiest airports in America. This could be a daunting and intimidating task, but every day a non-intimidating canine battles through the large crowds sniffing backpacks and luggage looking for food.
When people think of law enforcement canines, beagles are probably one of the last breeds someone would envision. Anderson believes the programme to start using beagles began in the 80s. “We wanted to create public awareness of the agricultural programme. Beagles are cute and cuddly and not int...
A host of Finns imported goods from outside the European Union (EU) in 2022 for their private use. Of these individuals, 250,000 used the Customs Duty Calculator
At the time, Finnish Customs was implementing a strategy that included a component for pilot projects. The budget for pilot projects made it possible to start cooperation with VTT, one of Europe’s leading research institutions. VTT already had experience in the area of carbon footprints and had...
The land of Peru can be divided into three natural areas: the coastal region; the mountains; and the forests. All these areas have different species of fauna and flora, making it a country with a rich and varied biodiversity, and the home of species sought by colle...
Environmental concerns are at the centre of many policies which impact on trade, and which Customs administrations consequently have to implement. Some of those policies are already into force, while others are under negotiation at the regional and int...
Discussions also touched on the taxation of carbon emissions. Participants learned about the initiative launched by a member of the automotive industry to measure the CO2 emissions of products and their constituent parts, and to track this information though the entire value chain.
...
A rising global population and higher standards of living have in turn led to an exponential increase in the consumption of goods, resulting in greater quantities of waste. The word “waste” covers a very wide spectrum of discarded material, encompassing household items, electrical and electro...
Waste trade
Between 1992 and 2012, the volume of waste traded grew from 45.6 million tonnes to 222.6 million tonnes, an increase of more than 500% in just two decades! The proportion of the world’s waste being exported ...