WASHINGTON -- Customs officials in the United States and Europe have agreed on what steps to take to reach an agreement on mutual recognition of supply chain security programs by 2009. During a meeting last week in Brussels, Jayson Ahern, U.S. Customs Customs and Border Protection deputy commissioner and Robert Verrue, director-general of the European Commission’s Taxation and Customs Union Directorate, agreed to a “roadmap” for negotiations in six areas to achieve parity between the U.S. Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism and the European Union Authorized Economic Operator program. Both programs are intended to achieve higher levels of security through voluntary actions by shippers, carriers and intermediaries. However, the AEO program includes a compliance audit component that C-TPAT does not.
In 2007 U.S. and EC officials began the mutual recognition process with comparisons of the two regimes, and a pilot program in which U.S. officials observed the security aspects of the AEO program.
Officials said that the six areas to be negotiated are political, administrative, legal, policy, technical/operational, and evaluation, including benchmarks to measure progress.
Other steps this year include:
-- Establish guidelines for the exchange of validation or audit results;
-- Joint verifications to determine remaining gaps between AEO/C-TPAT;
-- An export component for C-TPAT;
-- Exchange of best practices;
-- Discussions of legal and policy developments;
-- Endorse and sign a mutual recognition arrangement;
-- Evaluate mutual recognition benefits for AEO and C-TPAT members.
-- R.G. Edmonson
Journal of Commerce
