As part of its Strategic Trade Controls Enforcement (STCE) Project, the WCO organized an unprecedented law enforcement operation to detect and prevent illicit trafficking of strategic goods in international supply chains. The operation, which went under the code name of ‘Cosmo’, brought toget...
Identifying shipments containing prohibited or smuggled goods is somewhat like searching for the proverbial “needle in a haystack” for Customs officers. Let’s keep this image in mind: modern container ships are like massive “haystacks,” each carrying up to 20,000 containers. It’s the ...
Training delivery and gender mainstreaming
At the outset, the two Organizations adopted a staged approach in the way they delivered the programme. Activities are organized over a period of at least three years in stages, referred to as th...
Much has been said about illicit trade and over the years many articles touching on this subject have been published in this magazine covering, amongst others, drugs, tobacco, ivory, counterfeiting, cash and dual-use goods. In this edition we put the spotlight on some lesser known illicit trade i...
In October 2014, the WCO launched a new project aimed at enhancing Customs’ capacity to counter wildlife trafficking by ensuring that all trade in wild plants and animals, and any products derived from them, is legal in terms of the implementing provisions of the Convention on International Tra...
It is often said that where there is a will there’s a way, but the reverse can also be true: improving Customs administrations’ capacity to understand and implement regulations might influence their willingness to make commitments. By developing and disseminati...
When it comes to enforcing STCs, Customs is generally, although not always, the main agency involved at the border. Depending on the situation of a country, determining whether traders are compliant is a challenging task, especially for dual-use goods. As Renaud Chatelus explained in an article p...
Measuring the programme’s performance
The following data can be taken into account when trying to assess the impact of the programme:
The ambitious goal envisaged by the creators of the WCO COPES Project was to initiate a dialogue reflecting on the working methods used to combat fraud, from the identification of an offence to the storage of seized assets, including reporting, collecting and preserving evidence.
In additi...
The WCO digital toolbox contains an extensive variety of instruments and tools to help Customs incorporate information and communications technology (ICT) into their daily work, one of which is the National Customs Enforcement Network (nCEN) application.
It has been almost three years sinc...
The Swiss art market, being one of the largest in the world, inevitably attracts objects of dubious provenance. Some of these stolen or plundered objects not sold directly on the Swiss market are held in Switzerland pending their insertion in the legal distribution system, whether in Switzerland ...
The rapid development of the Internet in the past decade has drastically and positively changed every aspect of our lives. People, in almost all cities across the world, are today virtually connected with each 24/7. But thanks to its speed, expediency and anonymity, internet-based technology has ...
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 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...
Identifying the trade in fisheries products that have been illegally caught is challenging. This article provides an overview of the solutions being developed by governments, inter-governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the private secto...
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...
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...
Illicit trade endangers the healthy structure of trade and industry, and requires constant vigilance from Customs administrations, which, due to their position at the border, play a critical role in combating this trade that causes enormous detriment to state revenues and that of industries aroun...
Although the term has not been defined in international law, it is commonly held that light aviation comes under the heading of general aviation, a generic term covering all civil aviation operations other than commercial transport, in other words sports and leisure aviation, aerial work and priv...
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...
Over the past decade the global security environment has evolved, allowing rogue nation-states, sanctioned terrorist organizations, and violent criminal syndicates to operate on a transnational scale, converging in pursuit of common objectives. Today, these illicit...
In June 2015, when the partially decomposed body of an unidentified little girl, known as Baby Doe, was found in a trash bag on a beach on Deer Island in Boston Harbour, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the United States (US) contacted US...
Launched in October 2014, the INAMA project aims to strengthen the enforcement capacity of Customs administrations in Sub-Saharan Africa, while focusing on the illegal trade in wildlife, particularly on species listed in the appendices of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Specie...
For years, Customs administrations have been able to transform the raw information they collect on drugs, weapons, and humans trafficking into data which could be analysed to provide meaningful insights in the fight against these illegal activities. However, when i...
In late December 2010, the news broke about a Seattle court case involving counterfeit honey. A 70-year old Bellevue, Washington man, Chung Po Liu, had been sentenced to a year and a day in prison and was ordered to pay 400,000 US dollars (USD) in restitution for importing falsely declared Chines...
Changing strategies
Then the Chinese exporters changed their strategy. This time the shipments were sent from China, but they weren’t declared as honey. The shipping documents labelled the cargo as sugar syrup. “They ...
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...
Statistics have shown that criminals are increasingly active in seeking out and exploiting the vulnerabilities of air travel to illegally smuggle dangerous, prohibited and restricted items by air. The WCO Illicit Trade Report 2019 reveals that “in 2018, 126 countries submitted 45,497 drug traff...
In countries where scanning equipment is available, one solution would be for Customs authorities to increase the inspection ratio for inbound travellers and their belongings. However, frequent screening with traditional standalone X-ray scanners can sometimes be inconvenient, stressful and even ...
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 ...
A basic need of any law enforcement agency is to be able to positively identify controlled substances in seized drug samples, as well the purity of the drug, which will support legal proceedings and, hopefully, result in successful convictions. Research aimed at shedding light on the chemical pro...
Scientists determined long ago that there is a direct causal link between smoking and ill-health for both smokers and passive smokers. Despite overwhelming evidence, some stakeholders continued to peddle doubt regarding the health implications until this false contention was no longer tenable.
Trade has always been one of the manifestations of freedom and power. The idea of a “free port” can be traced back to 167 BC, when the Roman Senate made a decision to turn the then Roman island Delos into a free port[1]. City-States in the early Middle Age...
The same characteristics that make free zones attractive to legitimate business also lure fraudsters and criminals. They can forge documents and use free zones to repackage or relabel goods, or manufacture and assemble new goods in these zones. The transit and transshipment of goods pose the high...
Several European Union (EU) Member States recently participated in a simulation exercise aimed at analysing practices related to the implementation of the EU Dual-Use Export Control Regulation and identifying related challenges. The simulation gathered both Customs...
Outcomes and recommendations
The purpose of SimEX 2015 was not to teach that a particular way of implementing export control would be better than another. All participants in the preparation/master team and in the playing...
In a modern globalized world, Customs services require efficient and convenient tools to capture seizure data, data which will enable to strengthen its risk management capacities. The Georgia Revenue Service (GRS), which gathers the Tax and Customs Administration and the Sanitary and Phytosanitar...
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...
After routinely targeting a car import for inspection, a US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) international trade specialist noticed an unusual cat-and-mouse move: The importer did not process the targeted vehicle for United States (US) entry and instead shipped the car, a Land Rover Defender, ...
When enforcement authorities or players in the art market suspect that cultural goods have been acquired illegally, they need experts to determine the quality, origin and value of the objects. In the United Kingdom, the British Museum is the expert body they turn t...
Protocol
Our expert advice is sought in confidence. If the items prove to be ancient and in breach of antiquities laws, national legislation and/or declaration, we notify the relevant national museum in the country where ...
Uganda Customs adopted the National Customs Enforcement Network (nCEN) back in 2015. It took time to enter information in the application and to convince enforcement officers of its benefits. But today, with 1,200 cases validated in the database, the appreciation of the system has greatly improve...
The nCEN consists of three independent databases. The principal database of national seizures and offences comprises data required for analysis, as well as means of conveyance, routes, and the possibility to view photos depicting exceptional concealment methods. Two supplementary databases contai...
When it comes to Customs, Europe is at a turning point. In a globalized and fast-paced world, where trade is becoming increasingly liberalized, the role of Customs is changing. Governments around the world are increasingly emphasizing the removal of barriers and the creation of a seamless flow of...
Following the creation of a Command Centre within the Enforcement Division’s Anti-Smuggling Department in 2012, Serbia Customs has significantly improved its capacity to fight smuggling. This improvement can be attributed to the implementation of a range of tools...
The Maldives Customs Service recently installed the Global Travel Assessment System (GTAS), an advance passenger data risk assessment system that enables advance passenger information (API) and passenger name record (PNR) data to be collected and analysed. In this ...
Implementation journey
Up until 2017, the Maldives Customs Service did not have a clear action plan for the implementation of an API and PNR transmission and processing system. But in October 2017, a representative of th...
Hong Kong Customs’ enforcement strategy is multi-pronged. The administration attaches equal importance to developing efficient enforcement tactics, educating the public and engaging with it, maintaining close collaboration with its overseas enforcement counterpar...
Memoranda of Understanding
After some discussions, in March 2015, Hong Kong Customs signed Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) with five major express courier operators, namely DHL Express (Hong Kong) Limited, Federal Expre...
Every year, thousands of artefacts disappear from museums, churches, private collections, public institutions or archaeological sites. From antique weapons to paintings, from coins to watches, from religious objects to archaeological finds, tens of thousands of specimens forming part of the world...
The flow of consignments delivered by postal operators or express courier services, sometimes over borders, is increasing at a rapid rate. Most of the consignments are small and generally of “low value.” The fact that the value is low often means not only are t...
Today, it is widely recognized that the growing e-commerce sector is beneficial to economies, providing new growth engines, developing new trade modes, driving new consumption trends, and creating new jobs. It has especially opened up growth opportunities to micro, small and medium-sized enterpri...
Three West African countries announced the publication of a joint portal for Customs verification of minerals at this year’s Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Forum for Responsible Mineral Supply Chains...
Palestine Customs aims at creating an environment supportive of the national economy by preserving the security and safety of the community and combating smuggling, tax evasion, and commercial fraud in all its forms. All laudable activities for a territory that faces enormous daily challenges on ...
The nCEN was installed at the beginning of 2018. In February of the same year, two Palestinian Customs officers working respectively in IT and in risk management participated in a workshop organized by the WCO, giving them the opportunity to learn:
Customs analysts use the nCEN data to identify risk criteria and set up the data analytics functionality such as automated searches on new data, and matching rules that allow users to identify connections between data elements in the application.
The fact that the latest version of CENcomm...
The continued slaughter of elephants by humans and the cross-border smuggling of their ivory are endangering the existence of this magnificent species. Without concerted action and innovative techniques to stop the massacre fuelled by the greed of individuals who trade in illegal ivory, t...
Although Burkina Faso has long been regarded as a land lacking in natural resources, over the space of just a few years, the country has been transformed into a mining player specializing in the production of gold. Among the reasons for this growth in the country’s extractive industries are the...
Gold exports
The gold exported by the industrial mines is sold to Metalor Technologies International, a Switzerland-based limited company, which specializes in the refining of precious metals. Artisanal miners, individual...
The State of Israel has a rich history, with more than 30,000 known antiquity sites across the country. Most of these sites are out in the open, unguarded, and easily reached by the public. Neighbouring countries, such as Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey, are in the same situation, ...
Enhancing protection
The efforts of the Antiquities Theft Prevention Unit (ATPU) of the IAA to overcome this phenomenon consist of several activities that include:
The taxation of tobacco is a core policy mechanism for reducing cigarette smoking. Evidence shows that the greater the tobacco tax increase, the lower the cigarette consumption. National revenue agencies, such as Customs, collect enormous amounts of cigarette taxes every year through impo...
It is a known fact that sites across Serbia are being dug over and destroyed by treasure hunters and antique traders, and that valuable cultural artefacts are ending up in auctions or antique fairs in the West, where they sell for amounts which, although very high, far reflect their actual cultur...
WCO Members have been drawing and sharing lessons from their experiences in combating illicit trade associated with Free Zones (FZs) for decades now. One lesson is that there is a need for effective or better monitoring and control by Customs over these zones. However, changing existing FZ regime...
WCO research paper
Many papers, such as those produced by the Financial Action Task Force (2010), the International Chamber of Commerce (2013), INTERPOL (2013), Viski et al. (2016), The Economist (2018), the Organisation ...
The New Year kicked off with positive news for wildlife, with the Chinese authorities announcing the capture and repatriation of a prolific ivory trafficker. This was the culmination of a major investigation led by the Anti-Smuggling Bureau of China Customs, which has disrupted two major wildlife...
The sea cucumber trail
In-depth research and investigations by the EIA between 2014 and 2017 provided unique insights into the role of a major Chinese criminal syndicate involved in the trafficking of elephant ivory from ...
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...
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 ...
Destruction, illegal excavations, theft, plundering and the illicit export of legally-protected cultural heritage can rob a country of its national treasures, and can often cause irreparable damage to a country’s history and cultural identity.
The illicit trade in cultural objects is a w...
Customs administrations collate a significant volume of data on a daily basis. For instance, the Korea Customs Service (KCS) accumulates 45 GB of structured data and 30 GB of unstructured data in its database every day. However, most Customs administrations were until now not able to leverage suc...
The challenge
With the exponential growth in e-commerce, the number of small parcels to be cleared by Customs has skyrocketed, stretching the limits of Customs enforcement capacities. Korea has a tax-exemption system and ...