From 16 to 18 May 2022, the World Customs Organization (WCO) conducted a National Workshop on Combatting Counterfeiting and Piracy in Cambodia. The Workshop was held thanks to financial support from the Customs Cooperation Fund of Japan (CCF/Japan) and in collaboration with the WCO Regional Office for Capacity Building for Asia/Pacific (ROCB A/P).

This Workshop was aimed mainly at supporting implementation of Cambodia Customs’ new regulation on Customs IPR border enforcement. The regulation was introduced in 2021 to stop counterfeit items at Cambodia’s border following applications by right holders.

During the Workshop, the intellectual property right (IPR) experts from the WCO and the ROCB A/P described the legal basis for IPR enforcement, such as the WTO TRIPS Agreement¹ , while representatives from Cambodia Customs Headquarters gave a detailed presentation on the new regulation. The experts also shared their knowledge of how to implement IPR enforcement effectively and of international best practices in that domain, including cooperation with stakeholders, information sharing with other Customs administrations and the WCO, and risk management.

In addition, on 19 May 2022 the experts went on a study visit to the Customs office at Phnom Penh International Airport to hold discussions with frontline officers conducting passenger and cargo inspections as well as risk analysis. Cambodia Customs has successfully intercepted a large number of illicit COVID-19 test kits. Accordingly, the experts presented global trends in illicit COVID-19-related items, comparing the situation both before and as we come out of the COVID-19 pandemic, and suggested some practical enforcement measures to safeguard citizens’ health and safety.