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Challenges and opportunities for Cross border e-commerce through Customs and Postal cooperation

The cooperation with the WCO and the UPU has a long history of pursuing common goals to ensure and facilitate the free and secure movement of postal items, collaborating for over 50 years.

In line with the new WCO-UPU Cooperation Agreement signed in May 2022 and in order to further strengthen collaboration between the two Organizations, the WCO and UPU will organize the first Join Global Conference as a first significant and symbolic step under the new Agreement.

The Joint Global Conference will bring together policy and decision-makers, as well as operational experts from Customs and DOs around the world, for discussions. Its goal is to explore various topics relating to common challenges, find cooperation opportunities between DOs and Customs, and identify related policy orientation with a view to implementation in a standardized and harmonized manner.

We expect the Joint Conference will offer identifying synergies to enhance coordination and cooperation in order to strengthen security and facilitation of Customs procedures for the global postal chain. Additionally, the Conference serves as a global platform for high-level officials and experts from Customs and DOs, as well as for other stakeholders, to exchange information, experiences, know-how and best practices. 

It will assist in identifying emerging challenges and their potential solutions, while increasing the awareness of Customs and postal regulatory frameworks, their mandates, and available instruments and tools.  The expected outcomes include the following.

• Enhanced cooperation between Customs and Posts at strategic, policy and operational level 
• Prioritization of, and commitment towards, the implementation of key initiatives relating to the Postal-Customs clearance process 
• Enhanced political and executive engagement in terms of elucidating policy frameworks and resource requirements 
• Sharing best practices necessary to develop policy, regulations and associated project plans related to EAD, E-Commerce and their implementations 

Should you have any questions, please contact the WCO-UPU Conference organizing team (wcoupuglobalconf-event@wcoomd.org, customs@upu.int).

We look forward to welcoming you at the first WCO-UPU Global Conference.