Authorities undergo training to combat counterfeit smuggling
ASub Regional Workshop on combating counterfeiting, Piracy (IPR) and Cargo Targeting System concluded at the Fiji Revenue & Customs Service (FRCS) yesterday.
The week-long workshop was officially opened by the Australian High Commissioner to Fiji, John Feakes.
He said Australia had partnered with both the World Customs Organisation and United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to deliver the Container Control Programme.
“In January 2019, Australian Prime Minister Morrison announced a ‘comprehensive border security assistance package’ to
Fiji as part of the Fiji-Australia Vuvale Partnership,” Mr Feakes said.
Protecting borders
FRCS chief executive officer, Visvanath Das said protecting borders, revenue collection and facilitating legitimate trade and travel is a challenge for all customs administration.
“This training is very timely as we have investigated four cases involving vehicle smuggling rackets in 2019,” Mr Das said.
“We uncovered the “modus operandi” being used is accident and insurance written-off vehicles purchased and the same number plates and road worthiness are used on illegally imported vehicles,” he said.
“Another main objective of this workshop is to provide relevant stakeholders with an overview of the country-specific best practices and legislation in the domain of counterfeiting and piracy.
“It is to also create a favourable environment for the sharing of experiences on a variety of topics which includes distinguishing between authentic and fake product and how to distinguish the risk analysis techniques.”
The workshop was funded by the Regional Office for Capacity Building (ROCB) and supported by the Japan Customs and the World Customs Organisation.