Deputy Director – Procedures and Facilitation, Mr. Luc De Blieck, representing the World Customs Organization, attended and addressed the opening ceremony of 2018 FIATA World Congress. The Congress is taking place in New Delhi, India from 26th to 29th September, 2018. Mr. De Blieck reflected on the key drivers that are defining the global Customs agenda and are driving the discourse on the future of international Customs. Among others, Mr. De Blieck highlighted that trusted partnerships between Customs and businesses are the cornerstone for tacking future challenges.
The FIATA World Congress serves as an international platform where stakeholders in global logistics gather to voice their opinions and concerns and speak for their sector. A plethora of topics are covered from various speakers and panelists. Many interesting speeches focused on analyzing the current situation both at regional, as well as at the international level, while some others emphasized on future projections of the logistics sector.
On Thursday, September 27, 2018, during the session “FIATA Logistics Academy (FLA) & Advisory Body Vocational Training (ABVT)” the World Customs Organization signed a Cooperation Agreement with FIATA. The purpose of the agreement is to initiate cooperation between WCO Academy and FIATA in the establishment of joint training courses. One of the main objectives is to cooperate towards disseminating Customs e-learning courses, offered by the WCO Academy, to the international logistics community through the network and the website of FIATA.
More specifically, FIATA has validated 61 training programs in 43 countries which are offered by its member Associations to the ones interested in obtaining the FIATA Diploma in Freight Forwarding. FIATA has established a set of 14 Standards for the acquisition of this diploma. In order to cover one of the minimum standards, it is recommended by FIATA that its members dedicate at least 30 hours on Customs Procedures. Therefore, a major part of the cooperation between WCO Academy and FIATA Logistics Academy will be directed towards providing Customs e-learning to FIATA’s validated training programs. Among others, there is also a mutual intention to organize joint webinars, as well as to offer joint certificates.
The 2018 FIATA World Congress theme is “The Future Starts Here” and this is also certainly valid for the newly established cooperation in training matters, between WCO and FIATA.