Encouraging respect for equal opportunities and inclusion are consistent with the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) from 1948; and considered a prerequisite for achieving sustainable development and growth and enhancing performance in organizations.
Studies indicate that incorporating an inclusive perspective in capacity building and development programmes can contribute to improving the overall outcomes and ensuring the sustainability of activities, since services thereby are adapted to the specific needs of different groups. Based on the above, the WCO finds it essential to make Inclusion a priority in its capacity building agenda. Inclusiveness has also been integrated as one of the core guiding principles for the WCO in its Strategic Plan 2025-2028. This is an illustration of the organizations strong commitment to building and promoting a diverse workforce which reflects its Membership and global society.
The WCO started its work to promote Inclusion through its specific work on Gender Equality in 2013, when the international conference “Women in Customs, Trade and Leadership” was organized, gathering 160 participants from 50 countries. This conference addressed the challenges women traders face and the need to engage women’s organizations in discussions on international trade.
As an outcome of this conference, the WCO developed the Gender Equality Organizational Assessment Tool (GEOAT), a self-assessment tool aiming at helping Customs Administrations assess their policies, practices and activities, to see how they can address Gender Equality and Inclusion on a holistic basis within their different areas of competences, both internally in human resource management and externally in border operations and engagement with stakeholders.
In 2017, the WCO Virtual Working Group for Gender Equality and Diversity was launched with the purpose of providing a platform for Members to exchange experiences and raise awareness of the GEOAT. The WCO has also developed training material to further assist its Members in practically implementing gender equality and inclusion. This blended training package, initially developed in 2018, has been continuously enhanced over the years. The current material is structured around topic specific components and also includes two e-learning modules available free of charge on the WCO CLiKC! and Academy platforms.
Together with the support from Members, the WCO updated the GEOAT in 2019 to add new content, including definitions of gender equality and inclusion -related concepts, a chapter on how to implement gender mainstreaming through project management, and new cross-cutting indicators necessary for implementing gender mainstreaming.
Under the framework of the Gender Equality component of the West Africa Security Project (WASP), further updates were carried out to make the tool more user-friendly. A new dedicated chapter was also developed on Security and Safety, and a template was added to support Members in conducting the self-assessment. The new version of the GEOAT was launched in December 2023.
A key milestone was the adoption of the WCO Declaration on Gender Equality and Diversity, which the WCO Council endorsed in December 2020.
In addition, the WCO regularly publishes Compendiums on GED in Customs, showcasing different examples of how its Members work to advance this agenda further within their respective administrations. Compendiums were launched in 2021 (first edition) and 2023 (second edition) and 2025 (third edition).
Over the years the WCO has gradually expanded its work in this area, incorporating wider Inclusion topics, such as Disability Inclusion, gathering good practices from Members in this field.
The WCO looks forward to further promoting Inclusion in its activities and invites its Members to keep the Secretariat informed of any initiatives and progress made in this regard.
More information on these initiatives can be found on the links below. Contact: integrity@wcoomd.org