The Regional Workshop on Transposition of PACER Plus Tariff Schedules and Products Specific Rules (PSR) from HS 2012-HS 2017 was held at the Tanoa International Dateline Hotel, Tonga on 21-24 January, 2019.
The Workshop was conducted by OCO Consultants and Secretariat and in partnership with the Tonga Ministry of Revenue and Customs. 36 Trade and Customs Officials from the 11 PACER Plus Parties (Australia, Cooks Islands, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand, Niue, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu) took part in the four-day workshop.
The main objective of the workshop was to provide Parties with the technical knowledge and tools to effectively transpose their national schedule of commitments on tariffs and Product Specific Rule from HS 2012 into HS 2017 consistent with their obligations under the Agreement. Two Transposition Guidelines were provided to the participants, Guideline for Transposing Tariff Schedules and Product Specific Rules and an Excel Transposition Tool to assist them with the transposition work. The Workshop also provided an avenue for policy dialogue between trade and customs officials on the procedures for transposition, their respective national transposition work program and other relevant customs issues such as automation. The Workshop and the capacity building support for customs procedures is funded under the PACER Plus Readiness Package administered by OCO.