From 1 to 2 June 2021 the World Customs Organization (WCO) successfully delivered an HRM (Human Resource Management) Conference under the theme Building Customs Resilience through Human Capital for the WCO Americas region. The conference, attended by up to 500 participants from Customs, academia as well as private and public organizations from the region, was organized in partnership with the WCO Vice-Chair of Americas and Caribbean region and benefited from the financial support of the SECO-WCO Global Trade Facilitation Programme.

In his keynote speech, WCO Secretary General Dr. Kunio Mikuriya noted the key actions the WCO has taken during the COVID-19 pandemic while also emphasizing the need for Customs’ leaders to focus on recovery and the resilience of the supply chain to better face the current challenges. Dr. Mikuriya noted the need to put people in the center of this change and recalled that this conference was in line with the WCO theme for 2021: Customs bolstering Recovery, Renewal and Resilience for a sustainable supply chain.

The conference was facilitated by 21 widely recognized leaders in their industry (from Customs Administrations DGs and Customs HRM Directors, international organizations, academia, private sector and consultants). They shared with participants their proven practices, strategies and interventions in building organizational resilience through human capital from different perspectives. These will definitively equip Customs’ leaders, Customs’ HRM professionals, managers and employees to anticipate and adapt to the nature of crisis, act decisively, respond and recover from real or potential business disruptions. The conference resulted in 20 key recommendations widely accepted by the WCO Members and partners.

The participants appreciated WCO’s initiative for this instructive and well organized conference and encouraged the WCO Secretariat to continue organizing People-centered events on a regular basis.

For more information about this conference and the WCO People Development offer, please, contact capacity.building@wcoomd.org.