News
Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) agreed to share a common goal of developing an Asia Cargo Highway (ACH) to realize seamless cargo flows in Asia.
They also decided to make efforts over the next decade?or until 2020?to achieve the goal.
The agreement was reached during the ASEAN-Japan Directors-General/Commissioners Meeting on Trade Facilitation, which was held in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on April 28-29, 2011.
The meeting was co-hosted by the Ministry of Finance (MOF) of Japan, the General Department of Customs and Excise of Cambodia and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
Representatives of the customs authorities of Japan and ASEAN member countries, the ADB, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the World Customs Organization (WCO) exchanged views on future initiatives for facilitating logistics activities in Asia.
Japan, which was represented at the meeting by the MOF's Customs and Tariff Bureau, propose the ACH concept.
To realize the ACH, Japan and the ASEAN decided to introduce the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) system, ratify each other's AEO systems, adopt information technology (IT) in trade formalities, establish a single-window system and link their single-window systems with others.
They also gave themselves a specific time frame to achieve the goal.
Japan and the ASEAN adopted a Statement of the Chairs, which was made up of the agreements reached and decisions made during the meeting.
