The World Customs Organization (WCO) has successfully completed a Time Release Study (TRS) Workshop for the Customs Administration of Kazakhstan, at the latter’s request.  The Workshop was held virtually from 19 to 22 October 2020, using a videoconferencing platform.

The Workshop aimed to create the right environment for the Customs Administration to measure the actual time required for the release and/or clearance of goods, from the time of arrival until the physical release of cargo, with a view to finding bottlenecks in trade flow process and taking the necessary measures to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of border procedures.

During the event, the WCO expert gave a number of presentations to the Workshop participants in order to familiarize them fully with the WCO TRS methodology, including a key presentation on the TRS concept, highlighting the importance for countries of carrying out a regular TRS, and a presentation on the TRS experience of other countries, underscoring the significant positive impact on countries in terms of lower clearance times as a result of conducting a regular TRS.

Given that the level of digitalization of national clearance processes plays a key role during the data collection process in any country carrying out a TRS, the Customs Administration of Kazakhstan described the state of play concerning implementation of the national Single Window to the WCO expert.  In the context of digitalization, the Administration indicated that the country already had a Single Window electronic platform up and running and that the platform covered different events in the clearance process, including activities related to Customs and Ministry of Agriculture interventions in the process.  The Administration also reported that further work was being carried out and efforts made to ensure that the platform included interventions by other cross-border regulatory agencies.

At the end of the Workshop, equipped with a clear understanding of the TRS methodology and cognizant of the challenges currently facing many WCO Members when it came to conducting a TRS against the backdrop of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Customs Administration of Kazakhstan stressed that it would probably only be able to embark on a TRS next year.