Action programme for customs (Customs 2020), 2014-2020

This Commission staff working Paper on the Customs 2020 programme concerns the progress report for 2014.

The report highlighted that 2014 was an exceptional year as it included a transition between two generations of Customs programmes (Customs 2013 to Customs 2020).  

Key strengths in 2014:

• High level of achievement of results of the Joint Actions. This indicates that the business owners see the value of the programme for achieving the policy objectives.
• Very positive evaluation of the achieved results of the Joint Actions, their usefulness and met expectations by national customs officials who participated in them. Participants find that the programme activities correspond to their stated objectives and are professionally useful to them. 
• Networking and sharing of programme outputs represent both a strength and a room for improvement. The indicators are high and testify to the networking value provided to the participants by the programme and to the fact that the outputs are often shared nationally through dissemination or training sessions.
• The volume of data traffic on European Information Systems significantly increased in 2014, while the performance and availability remained very high.
• The increased use of programmes information and collaboration space (PICS) by national and European customs officials. The number of online groups has nearly doubled during the year, with significant increases in the number of users and the number of exchanged files on the platform.

Main recommendations:

• Monitor the number of participants: the number of participants has been steadily decreasing over the years, with 2014 representing an exceptionally strong decrease in this respect. While this seems to be an exceptional situation due to the change of programmes, it is recommended to keep an eye on the number of participants in the future in order to evaluate whether any action aimed at reversing this trend is warranted.
• Increase awareness about the programme: national customs officials, beyond those already participating in the programme activities, should be addressed through a targeted communication strategy informing them of the programme and its potential benefits to them. 
• Provide additional support to networking and the use of the programme outputs: a knowledge management policy for the use of programme outputs would open up the programme benefits to new users and facilitate the sharing and findability of programme outputs.
• Improve statistics for online collaboration: better statistics are needed in order to separate customs / tax groups and users on programmes information and collaboration space (PICS), as well as differentiate among them based on more precise work areas.
• Monitor the implementation and take up of the Customs Competency Framework (CFW): while much of the work on the Customs Competency Framework was done during 2014, the roll out of the framework into the national training programmes will begin in 2015.
• Facilitate the collection and processing of data under the Performance Measurement Framework.