Improving the Border Agency Cooperation
Among the OIC Member States for Facilitating Trade
20
and health. It further provides for single-stop inspection and urges the national authorities of
adjacent countries to carry out joint and simultaneous inspections.
Harmonised operating hours: This applies particularly in the context of two neighboring
country customs offices – having same opening hours across the border helps to maximise the
daily throughput volumes. As Article 8 of the World Trade Organization´s Trade Facilitation
Agreement puts it, “Each Member shall, to the extent possible and practicable, cooperate on
mutually agreed terms with other Members with whom it shares a common border with a
view to coordinating procedures at border crossings to facilitate cross-border trade. Such
cooperation and coordination may include: … alignment of working days and hours … “. In
addition, in the ASEAN region, Article 7 of the ASEAN Framework Agreement on the
Facilitation of Goods in Transit urges the contracting parties to “coordinate working hours of
the adjacent border posts”.
1.3.3. BAC activities with government agencies as the primary beneficiary
The following five BAC actions can provide instant benefits for the cooperating government
agencies, in terms of cost savings and improved efficiency – or, in other words, “identifying
more violations and catching more bad guys with less total spending”.
Sharing of agency intelligence, information & data: Customs Mutual Assistance Agreements
(CMAAS), signed bilaterally by Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and eight
counterparties during years 1979-2010 (European Community, France, Germany, Mexico, the
Netherlands, South Africa, South Korea and the United States) provide Canada with a legal
basis to share customs information to prevent, investigate and combat customs offences,
particularly customs fraud, and to provide reciprocal mutual assistance to ensure the proper
application of customs laws. Under CMAAs Canada may share customs information pertaining
to: persons, goods and means of transport; activities planned, on-going, or completed, that
constitute or appear to constitute a customs offence in the territory of the country requesting
the data; proven law enforcement techniques; new and emerging trends, means or methods of
committing customs offences; and facilitation of risk assessment activities, within the mandate
and authority of the CBSA.
Joint investments in common resource pools (equipment, facilities etc.): In Finland the
Customs Administration and the Border Guard share common premises and equipment. Each
authority has a designated role in the servicing and maintenance of the equipment. X-ray
machines are largely the responsibility of Customs. Road-testing equipment, such as lorry
brake-testing pads, is also maintained by Customs. All equipment can be shared and operated
by each agency upon request. Thus, although the equipment belongs to one agency, it can be
easily relocated to the other agency, enabling smoother processing of the workflow without
unnecessary and lengthy administrative procedures, thereby reducing costs.
Joint teams: In the Netherlands, “HARC” - Hit and Run Cargo Rotterdam team, is a joint
operation of Dutch Maritime Police, Dutch Customs, the Fiscal and Economic Crime Agency and
the Ministry of Justice collaborating operationally in narcotics enforcement. Joint teams differ
from joint operations below by being a long-term or permanent set-up, while joint operations
are carried out on an ad-hoc basis.