CBP Commissioner Aims To Boost Cooperation with Trade

June 8th, 2010 Speaking at the 89th annual conference of the American Association of Exporters and Importers (AAEI) on June 7, recently appointed U.S. Customs & Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin said that he is committed to turning around the relationship between the agency and the trade community.

Bersin noted that in the wake of the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the subsequent organizational changes that saw the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, CBP, as an agency created “under duress,” has had a primary focus on U.S. security. He said that he has come to believe, however, that security and trade facilitation are not antithetical, and that the agency cannot improve the nation’s “security profile” without facilitating lawful trade.

He stressed that private-sector participation in trusted-trader programs in partnership with the agency are essential to efficient allocation of limited resources to improve security, noting that when 90% of the problems come from just 10% of the trade, CBP should not be committing its scarce manpower to focusing on the 90% of the trade that is “good.”

Bersin conceded that recognition of the importance of cooperation with the trade is not new, but, he said, what he hopes is new is the “intention to operationalize it. ” He anticipates that the agency will solicit private-sector input before issuing proposed new rules and regulations, to avoid the situations that arose in the past with proposals regarding the first-sale rule and country-of-origin rules.

The commissioner called on the attendees to boost participation in trusted trader and trusted traveler programs such as C-TPAT and Global Entry. Beyond revitalizing these programs, he said that there was a need to stop looking at borders as lines but to consider them “flows,” with an emphasis on pre-clearance before arrival at the physical border.

In response to a question by AAEI President and CEO Marianne Rowden, Bersin said that international cooperation is also important, and that, in the context of the World Customs Organization, the United States must move forward with countries that can do so, and then look to build capacity in those nations that are not yet ready to work at the same level.

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