Improving the Border Agency Cooperation
Among the OIC Member States for Facilitating Trade
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At the UAE level, the Federal Customs Authority is building a UAE-level risk management
engine for security purposes. The engine will eventually connect to the WCO Regional
Intelligence Liaison Office (RILO), INTERPOL and to other sources of law enforcement
intelligence around the world. So far, the Abu Dhabi customs has signed bilateral agreements
on exchange of information and intelligence with countries like Jordan.
Cross-border collaboration in customs training
Abu Dhabi customs is strongly committed to continuous education and training, with a special
training academy and a training directorate. There is also an own customs bachelor program in
collaboration with a local university.130 Training is taking place around the year, at three
levels: basic, medium and advanced. New recruits join a basic training course. People coming
from abroad, mainly from GCC countries131, participate in medium-level and advanced courses
on inspection, investigation, risk management and related subjects. Training activities have a
prominent international dimension in Abu Dhabi. Abu Dhabi has the WCO’s Regional Office for
Capacity Building for Middle East and North Africa (MENA region). The office helps customs in
the MENA countries to implement WCO conventions, guidelines and tools. Also the Federal
Customs Authority seeks to transfer knowledge and best practices from one customs to
another and to contribute to the international customs collaboration, especially at the GCC and
WCO levels.
GCC standard for customs declaration data
The common GCC customs law introduced a single administrative document (SAD), a standard
customs declaration dossier that all GCC countries use. The single administrative document
incorporates around fifty common data elements that traders must send to customs when
importing, transiting or exporting goods across the borders of the GCC customs union. Though
there are local variants of the single administrative document, the common data requirements
significantly reduce administrative burden for the trading community, customs and other
border control agencies. The single administrative document, and the associated common
dataset, also improves connectivity between different e-clearing systems132 in the GCC customs
union, paving the road towards a regional single window and the GCC-level common customs
risk assessment.
Towards regional e-clearance systems
Abu Dhabi has a modern semi-automated e-clearance system in place in the Port of Khalifa.
The system offers a single point of access for companies and government agencies to deal with
all matters concerning cross-border trade. Data is available for other border agencies, so they
can monitor the traffic and give their approvals in the system. Because the declaration system
is electronic and largely automated, customs brokers can declare goods at their own premises
through a single digital interface. The Abu Dhabi customs is in the process of implementing
similar e-clearance systems at other customs houses, as well. The system is expected to
accelerate the clearance process, in this way speeding up the release of goods and reducing
130 Abu Dhabi Customs Administration expert interview, 2016
131 Cross-training and staff exchange programs are stipulated also in the GCC common customs law.
132 Abu Dhabi uses a locally designed Dhabi e-clearance system, Dubai E-Mirsal, and Ras Al-Kaimah a tailored version of
Dhabi. In Bahrain, local customs use the ASYCUDA (Automated SYstem for CUstoms DAtasystem), a global e-clearance
system designed by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). Oman uses the TradeNet system
developed by the Singapore customs.