CBP Plans Continued Expansion of Unified Cargo Processing With Mexico, Canada
ATLANTA -- CBP recently signed a memorandum of understanding for implementation of unified cargo processing with the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) and will start a cargo processing pilot at Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport for exports to Mexico, CBP officials said Dec. 5 during the agency’s East Coast Trade Symposium. While he didn’t provide a specific date, Guadalupe Ramirez, assistant director for field operations at CBP’s Tucson field office, said that pilot will be the next expansion in Arizona of the processing project, adding that it will have a “huge impact” on the speed of exports from the airport to Mexico. Jose Garcia, representative for taxation and customs affairs at the Mexican Embassy in Washington, said his country’s customs agency wants to expand unified processing pilots to U.S. airports that ship high volumes of cargo to Mexico.
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CBP in August also signed an MOU with Mexican customs to provide “the necessary legal framework for these pilots to operate in both inbound and outbound environments, as well as the ability to expand the program to other locations,” CBP Office of International Affairs Acting Assistant Commissioner Ian Saunders said during the symposium panel. Mexican and U.S. customs agencies are considering expanding unified cargo processing pilots to the Laredo World Trade Port of Entry, El Paso, and Pharr, Texas, Garcia said. Ramirez touted the progress of ongoing pilots, including 100 percent participation rates at the ports of San Luis and Douglas in Arizona, enabled by the relatively low volume at the ports. Across Arizona’s land port of entry processing pilots, which also include Nogales, wait times have decreased by 12 percent on average in U.S. inbound lanes, Ramirez said.
A unified processing pilot for U.S. inbound rail shipments at Laredo that started in August is “showing a lot of potential” for information sharing and expediting rail shipments between Mexican and U.S. customs, Garcia said. “We base the process on sharing images” produced by non-intrusive inspection technology, he said. “Then … either [a Mexican customs] officer or CBP will determine which rail cars should be inspected.”
As for Canada, the CBSA is still following the “Beyond the Border” vision shared by the Obama and Trudeau administrations, Mike Leahy, executive director of CBSA’s Commercial Program Directorate, said during the panel. Among other things, that blueprint envisioned a common U.S.-Canadian single-window platform and cargo preclearance mechanism. Cargo preclearance and continued collaboration on border regulations were cited as shared goals in a February joint statement by President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (see 1702130030). Canada looks to continued customs collaboration with the U.S. at a time when the number of truck-carried shipments crossing from the U.S. into that country was up 21 percent during the second and third quarters of calendar year 2017, compared with the same period last year, Leahy said.