The World Customs Organization and the State Customs Committee of the Republic of Belarus organized a National Workshop on the Revised Kyoto Convention and the WTO Agreement on Trade Facilitation (WTO TFA) for improving the national Customs processing of expedited shipments from 15 to 19 July 2019 in Minsk, Belarus. The event was delivered with the financial assistance of the Customs Cooperation Fund Eurocustoms.
The workshop provided comprehensive information on international standards and WCO tools related to the Customs processing and Customs clearance of expedited shipments (express consignments), including relevant provisions of the RKC, the WCO Immediate Release Guidelines, and the provisions of Article 7.8 of the WTO TFA. The aim was to support Belarus Customs in implementing the “Roadmap on Expedited Shipments of the State Customs Committee of the Republic of Belarus” in conformity with international standards.
20 Customs officials from various divisions participated in the Workshop, identifying the gaps between the Roadmap developed by Belarus Customs on the optimization of Customs operations carried out in respect of goods transported in express consignments and the requirements of the WCO and WTO standards.
The concrete outcomes of the workshop were (1) Raising the awareness on the provisions of the RKC, the WCO Immediate Release Guidelines, Article 7.8 of the WTO TFA, and other relevant WCO tools (2) Identifying data elements and categorizing goods for immediate release in accordance with the WCO Immediate Release Guidelines, (3) Setting the way forward to address the gaps between the Roadmap developed by Belarus Customs and the requirements of the WCO and WTO standards.
Belarus, a member of the Eurasian Economic Union, has been a WCO Member since December 1993 and acceded to the RKC in January 2011. It is now in the process of acceding to the WTO and, as an important step, seeks to examine its compliance with the Customs-related measures of the WTO TFA. The Workshop supported the Customs officials in not only implementing the Roadmap but also in enhancing their detailed understanding of the implementation of immediate release provisions in relation to expedited shipments, an important requirement in the TFA.