Authorized Economic Operator Programs
In the Islamic Countries:
Enhancing Customs-Traders Partnership
43
Member States until 2010 in terms of AEO adoption. Malaysia and Tunisia started their AEO
programs in 2010 that would be accepted as the second wave in the AEO program adoption
among OIC countries. Starting from 2013 there has been a steady increase in AEO program
initiations. In 2013, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Uganda; in 2014, Egypt; in 2015, Indonesia
launched their AEO programs. Brunei Darussalam, Oman and Saudi Arabia are the countries
with the most recent AEO programs (Table 3.2 and Figure 3.2).
Figure 3.2. AEO Adoption in OIC Countries by Year (Cumulative)
Source: Authors’ compilation using WCO (2018) data.
Scrutinizing the regional distribution of the AEO programs, 6 of them are in the Arab Region,
and 5 of them are in the Asian Region. On the other hand, among the OIC countries in the
African region, only Uganda has an active AEO Program (Figure 3.3). In the Latin America
region there are only two countries where none of them have an active AEO program.
Compared to the World, with the lowest share of AEO program implementation the OIC region
is the second after Africa (Figure 3.4). Europe is the region with the highest number of AEO
programs. The main driver is that the EU is a trade union which can be named as a regional
AEO at the same time. Americas and Caribbean come second in terms of AEO program
implementation with 17 countries. Africa is the region with the lowest number of active AEO
programs. In the Figure, North Africa is excluded from Africa definition as those countries are
OIC members.
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