Promoting the Cooperation between the IPPC and the WCO

The Bilateral Meeting on Promoting the Cooperation between the IPPC and the World Customs Organization (WCO) was held 4 March 2016 at WCO-HQ in Brussels, Belgium. The IPPC delegate was composed of Mr Jingyuan Xia (the IPPC Secretary) and Mr Craig Fedchock (the IPPC Coordinator), and the WCO delegate consisted of Mr Kunio Mikuriya (the Secretary-General of WCO), Mr Alan Harrison (the Executive Officer of the Secretary-General Office) and Mr Theo Hesselink (the Technical Officer of Compliance and Facilitation). The main objective the meeting was to discuss the possibility to sign an agreement on the IPPC-WCO cooperation.

During the meeting, the IPPC Secretary made briefings on the IPPC s history, missions and core activities, the IPPC s strategic plan towards 2020 and its work related to UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) towards 2030, and the potential areas for promoting the IPPC-WCO cooperation. He also presented a draft agreement on the Cooperation between the IPPC and the WCO. The WCO Secretary-General expressed his appreciation for the IPPC s work in the area of trade, in particular in ePhyto. He stressed that there are a number of areas for the WCO-IPPC cooperation regarding trade facilitation such as the Single Window, the Data Model, the Big Data, etc. He also urged the WCO should work with the IPPC for the agreement on the bilateral cooperation and have it signed as soon as possible.

Both sides agreed that there is a great potential for enhancing the IPPC-WCO cooperation in order to make greater contribution to the UN-SDGs, in particular to the SDG 17 (Trade Facilitation) through promotion of the safe, fast and efficient trade.

See more about the WCO 5th Meeting of the TFA Working Group.