29-31 May 2023, Perth, Australia

The WCO A/P 24th Regional Heads of Customs Administrative Conference (RHCA) was held in Perth, Australia from 29 to 31 May 2023 hosted by the Australia Border Force as the Asia/Pacific Regional Vice Chair. Mr. Norikazu Kuramoto, the Head and Ms. Zhengqing (Grace) Ye and Mr. Jaemin Cho, the Program Managers of the ROCB A/P attend.

The Heads and delegations from Asia/Pacific region, Dr. Kunio Mikuriya, WCO Secretary General, the WCO Regional Development Manager for Asia/Pacific, the RILO A/P and the ROCB A/P attended the conference.

At the opening ceremony, Mr. Michael Outram, the Vice-Chair of Asia/Pacific warmly welcomed participants in person in Perth and acknowledged the Solomon Islands as the newest WCO Member in the region. Dr. Kunio Mikuriya congratulated the Asia/Pacific Vice Chair to organize RHCA conference and appreciated the leading role in Asia/Pacific region as well as he promoted digitalization and the utilizing of advance information to address E-Commerce in order to support supply chain resilience. He also explained that the WCO Strategic Plan focused on Digitalization, Green Customs (environment) and Governance and accountability. Ms, Hon Claire O’Neil MP, the Australian Minister for Home Affairs delivered an online keynote address highlighting the importance of borders, and Customs’ critical role in achieving growth, security, unity and prosperity in Asia/Pacific.

Mr. Norikazu Kuramoto, the Head of the ROCB A/P, updated its capacity building activities in the Asia/Pacific region including workshop achievement in this FY, Annual work plan for the next FY, Training Management Project in the Asia/Pacific, cooperation with regional entities and its publication. In addition, Ms. Zhengqing (Grace) Ye and Mr. Jaemin Cho also made report on the implementation of the Focus Area 3 (Capacity Building) of the Asia/Pacific Regional Strategic Plan 2022-2024 on behalf of co-coordinators with Japan Customs.

During the conference, applications of Australia, Hong Kong, China and Indonesia for Regional Dog Training center (RDTC) were atheized by heads. In addition, the MOU by WCO and Japan Customs for transferring the RILO A/P to Tokyo from January 2024 was signed.

For more information, please write to us at rocb@rocbap.org