WCO capacity building efforts continue to enjoy welcome support from established donors who contribute to the CCFs such as the Governments of Japan, Korea and Germany, India, China Customs and Eurocustoms. In addition, the establishment of a fund from the WCO’s reserve, known as the CCF/WCO Reserve Fund, was approved by WCO Council in July 2016. Many of the WCO capacity building activities delivered by these funds have a direct association to the WTO TFA and the Mercator Programme.
CCF China focuses on capacity building support to developing countries and least developing countries in all six WCO regions and, in this regard, have supported global, regional and national activity. Topics delivered have included valuation and AR, intelligence sharing, TFA implementation, integrity, E-Commerce and HRM.
Eurocustoms also support activities in all the WCO regions, and have consistency supported activities directly related to the Mercator Programme. This has recently included activity associated to strategic planning, RM, PCA, AR, HRM, LMD, integrity and performance measurement.
CCF Germany generally supports Members of the WCO Europe Region that are advancing with their preparations to become part of the EU. Recent support has included Mercator Programme activity associated to topics such as SW, pre-arrival processing and TRS.
CCF Japan provides support to capacity building activities in all six WCO regions, as well as to WCO Human Resource Development (HRD) programmes such as the Career Development Programme, the Scholarship Programme, the Fellowship Programme and the Regional Customs Laboratories (RCL) Programme. Capacity building support includes activites directly associated to the Mercator Programme along with revenue collection, security matters, the protection of society and new initiatives focused on small island economies.
CCF Korea continues to support Members in securing and facilitating international trade. Special emphasis is being placed on data analytics to assist Members to better collect and share Customs data, to manage risks more effectively and to profit from opportunities provided by new and emerging technologies. Activities have also included enhancing fraud detection techniques by machine learning, artificial intelligence-based targeting and geo-spatial analysis.
CCF India is a relatively new funding stream that focuses on developing and least developed countries with particular focus on Members in South Asia and small island economies. Support activities have included RM, LMD, Association of Southeast Asian Nations ASEAN8 transit, rules of origin and AR.
The WCO’s own CCF Reserve supports activities in all WCO regions, and finances capacity building activities in all areas. Activities range from technical assistance to workshops and seminars and have included LMD, CBM, AEO, TRS, integrity and Mercator implementation support along with Mercator scoping missions.