The 7th Steering Committee (SC) Meeting of the WCO-Finland ESA Project II took place from 4 - 6 February 2020 in Port Louis and hosted by the Mauritius Revenue Authority. The WCO-ESA Project II, “To progress the Trade Facilitation (TF) agenda within the framework of the WCO Mercator Programme in the East and Southern Africa Region, 2016 - 2020” is funded by the Finnish Government.

The Meeting was chaired by Mr. Philiso P. VALASHIA, Commissioner of Customs Services and ESA Vice-Chair, BURS and attended by SC members from Uganda, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Mauritius, Finnish Customs, and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, ESA ROCB and the WCO Secretariat.

The Steering Committee was presented the Mid-year Progress Report, Financial Report 1.7. – 31.12.2019 and a Budget Plan 1.1. – 30.6.2020. A total of 15 national activities (13 national in EN and 2 national in FR) were conducted over the reporting period.

The meeting was also presented with the findings and conclusions of the Mid-Term Evaluation Report and the WCO Management Response. Conclusions of the Report confirmed that the project has generally met all the 7 criteria applied in the evaluation: Relevance, Efficiency, Effectiveness, Impact, Sustainability, Coordination and Cross-Cutting Objectives.

The Vice-Chair’s office informed the meeting that the proposal for the possible 3rd phase of the project will be finalized by the end of February 2020. The proposal will take into account the developments within the WCO-ESA Project II, already existing TFA Mercator Implementation Plans, Regional Strategy and Implementation Plan, Regional Structures and Governance, AfCFTA and recommendations from the Mid-Term Evaluation Report.

For further information please contact capacity.building@wcoomd.org.