A virtual workshop on the Harmonized System (HS) 2022 amendments was held for African Portuguese-speaking Member administrations, from 13 to 15 December 2021. The workshop, conducted in Portuguese, was organized jointly by the WCO and the Angola Tax Administration, within the framework of the EU-WCO Programme for Harmonized System in Africa (HS-Africa Programme).

The workshop was attended by 70 Customs officials from all the six Portuguese-speaking Members of Africa - Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Mozambique and San Tomé and Príncipe. Six Customs Officials from the Classification Centre of the Brazilian Federal Secretariat of Revenues (Customs) joined the workshop as observers. The workshop was facilitated by two Portuguese-speaking experts – a Senior Technical Officer of the WCO Tariff and Trade Affairs Directorate and a WCO Accredited HS Expert Trainer from Brazil.

The workshop was opened by Mr. Santos Mussamo, Administrator of the Tax Administration of Angola. Speaking on behalf of the President of the Tax Administration of Angola, he emphasized the importance of correct tariff classification of goods and encouraged the participants to take advantage of the opportunity to have a better understanding of the HS 2022 amendments and to share the relevant information internally in their home administrations to promote the new edition of the HS.

The main focus of the workshop was to secure uniformity in the interpretation and application of the 2022 version of the HS. Furthermore, all participants were given an opportunity to report on the preparatory work to implement the HS 2022 amendments in their administrations and the challenges encountered therein. From the discussions it emerged that most countries plan to complete the implementation of the HS 2022 amendments in the first quarter of 2022. The participants expressed their appreciation for the opportunity to receive comprehensive explanations on the HS 2022 amendments, and reiterated their administrations’ strong commitment to continue the effort to migrate to the new version of the HS, with the support of the WCO and the HS-Africa Programme.

For more details, please contact hs@wcoomd.org or capacity.building@wcoomd.org.