New Programmes for WCO Members in Central Asia and the Caucasus by WCO/JICA Joint Project

Under the auspices of the WCO/JICA (Japan International Cooperation Agency) Joint Project, the WCO organized a high-level explanatory meeting on the Master Trainer Programme (MTP) on Risk Management and a programme on Time Release Study (TRS) for Central Asia and the Caucasus via virtual meeting platform on 25 April 2024. These new programmes are to respond to the growing importance of Middle Corridor/Trans-Caspian international transport route, which were also addressed in various high-level fora, including the G7 Hiroshima Summit in Japan in May 2023 , the G7 Transport Ministerial meeting in Italy in March 2024, and the “Customs Heads Meeting on the Project for simplifying transit customs procedure along the Trans-Caspian International ‘East-West’ Middle Corridor using ‘Single Window’ principle”, in Azerbaijan in March 2023.

The meeting was held to explain the outline of the two programmes before their start this July, inviting high-level representatives of participating WCO Members of the programmes, namely, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

The MTP aims to develop sustainable and autonomous training capacity in participating regions by 1) developing a pool of quality trainers and 2) developing regionally featured training materials and programmes to be used by these trainers. Upon completion of the MTP, successful participants are expected to become regional assets and contribute to facilitating legitimate trade while intercepting smuggling and fraud through enhanced Customs risk management capability. Also, a TRS programme will be conducted to release the maximum potential of the corridor, leading to the region’s economic development.

At the opening ceremony, Mr. Pranab Kumar Das, WCO Director for Compliance and Facilitation, Mr. Seiichi Negishi, Director for Public Governance and Financial Management, Governance and Peace Building Department of JICA Headquarters, and Mr. Takashi Nakao, Director for Technical Cooperation, Customs and Tariff Bureau, Japan Ministry of Finance, highlighted the importance of enhanced Customs capability and further improvement of connectivity which the new programmes set as objectives. These would also serve to implement Focus Area 1 of WCO Strategic Plan 2022-2025, “Technology and Innovation,” with the aim “to move towards SMART (Secure, Measurable, Automated, Risk Management-based, and Technology-driven) borders”.

Following the opening, a presentation explaining the new programmes was given. The background, outline, and planned schedule of the programmes were explained.

At the closing, Dr. Taeil Kang, WCO Director, Capacity Building Directorate, thanked the representatives for their participation and appreciated the longstanding cooperation of JICA and Japan Customs. He emphasized the importance of risk management and TRS for better border management and introduced the WCO activities featuring Big Data analysis and Artificial Intelligence, drawing attention to the possibility of future utilization of these technologies for the programmes.