BACKGROUNDS
The Permanent Secretariat of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic System (SELA) and the National Directorate of Customs of the Republic of Paraguay are organizing the “IX Latin American and Caribbean Regional Meeting on Foreign Trade Single Windows”, to be held in Asunción, Republic of Paraguay, on 26 and 27 October 2017.
At the VIII Meeting, held in San Salvador, Republic of El Salvador, on 13 and 14 October 2016, the attending delegations recommended that SELA, in inter-institutional synergy with other relevant bodies, should continue the efforts undertaken in 2010 with the First Latin American and Caribbean Regional Meeting on Foreign Trade Single Windows, jointly organized by the Permanent Secretariat and the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism of the Republic of Colombia.
Since then, the Permanent Secretariat of SELA has systematically promoted these annual regional meetings with a view to disseminating best practices and encouraging governments in the region to address the design of public policies and national instruments that promote national and regional efforts for the consolidation of Foreign Trade Single Windows (FTSW) in Latin America and the Caribbean, as part of the strategies for trade facilitation and trade and digital integration of the countries in the region.
This IX Latin American and Caribbean Regional Meeting on Foreign Trade Single Windows will include three thematic blocks, which will cover the management of information in FTSWs and its use in risk management; the progress in the implementation of the WTO trade facilitation agreement, the last recommendation of the UN-CEFACT on public-private partnerships for trade facilitation, and some elements of governance in FTSWs; the importance of transport facilitation in foreign trade and, as usual, participants will share the achievements and challenges of FTSWs in the member countries of SELA attending this meeting.
