CBP Moves Forward on Trade Facilitation Strategy

(American Shipper – Eric Kulisch)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection plans to implement its enhanced trade strategy on Oct. 1, according to Brenda Smith, executive director, trade policy and programs.

On Monday, the Commercial Operations Advisory Committee, an industry sounding board, submitted comments on the 30-page draft policy to the border management agency.

CBP has followed several aspects of the strategy in the past, but is now sharing its strategy with the public for the first time. The broad themes for returning more focus to trade issues instead of just priority security matters were unveiled in May:

• Trade facilitation and enforcement.

• Modernizing trade processes.

• Using a multilayered approach, using risk-management principles for enforcement as is done for allocating resources for security inspections.

• Industry partnerships to enhance compliance.

• Collecting advance information from the supply chain.

• Reviewing customs documents for potential fraud away from the border so that cargo shipments are not unnecessarily delayed.

The Bush administration has cleared CBP to go ahead with its trade plan, Smith told COAC at its quarterly meeting in Seattle earlier this month. She asked the 20-member panel to identify new ways to implement the strategy and submit suggestions at COAC’s next meeting in November to help the agency build off the priority trade issues established for the 2009 fiscal year budget plan.