Ian Saunders, Director, International Training & Assistance, CBP
Before 9/11, a lot of countries weren't focused.
Now that we have a new body of threats,
how exactly do we deal with these threats?
Robert Verrue, Director General, European Commission
We have to find a proper balance between
facilitation of trade and the fight again terrorism.
Matt Vega, Senior Counsel, Federal Express
We are one big global economy
and so what happens in one part of the supply chain will affect another.
Brenda Smith, Director, Policy & Programs, INATR, CBP
In this post 9/11 world, we really have a responsibility
to make sure that our supply lanes are secure for trade.
Jose Garcia, Ministry of Finance to US, Mexico
We see security and facilitation as two faces of the same coin.
Don't forget, we at Customs, we are the gatekeepers.
Renee Harris, CBP Attache, Mexico City
We are unique. CBP is unique because we are the interdictors.
We are like no other agency.
Lesley Ann Basset, Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy, Mexico
CBP is an essential player because they are
sort of where the rubber meets the road.
NARRATOR: American business and industry rely on
a steady flow of products and materials from all over the world.
But the millions of cargo containers streaming into our ports
and across our borders each year
also pose a grave potential threat,
because en route to the United States,
many of them pass through several ports and cross several borders
that lack adequate security,
giving terrorists ample opportunities to slip their own cargo,
including weapons of mass destruction, into the flow of legitimate trade.
NARRATOR: It is not enough for the United States
to secure its own borders and facilities;
it has to be a global priority.
This requires forming partnerships with Customs administrations in other nations
and with manufacturers, vendors and importers worldwide.
And that task belongs to CBP's Office of International Affairs or INA.
Brenda Brockman Smith, Former Director, Policy & Programs Division
As an operational agency,
CBP is really where the rubber meets the road.
It's important to identify strategic goals,
but when you come right down to it,
it's how we manage our border on a day-to-day basis.
NARRATOR: Achieving this mission requires coordinated effort
among operational divisions, beginning with the Policy & Programs Division.
Brenda Brockman Smith, Former Director, Policy & Programs Division
My Division is responsible for the international cooperation
between the United States Customs and Border Protection and their counterparts,
both on the Customs side and the Immigration side.
We set the strategy and then we work very closely
with our foreign attaches and representatives
and our Training and Assistance Division
to essentially identify where opportunities exist for partnership.
We have a number of multilateral organizations that we deal with,
like the World Customs Organization, the APEC,
the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation set of countries and economies.
We work on a bilateral basis with countries in the European Union,
countries in Asia and Africa and Latin America,
in order to identify again, common objectives.
NARRATOR: The challenge is to find common ground between
U.S. security objectives and the economic objectives of other countries.
BRENDA SMITH: What we're looking to do,
really, is to identify the best approach to security and facilitation.
Many times, the lifeblood of a country depends on its trade or on its tourism.
If we don't get trade and tourism right, the country, as a whole fails,
or they don't achieve their economic objectives.
So, the approach that we take is to
identify a mutually acceptable set of objectives
and figure out how, from both our perspectives,
we can get what we need to do.
GARCIA: Our collaboration with CBP is stronger and stronger every day.
We're neighbors.
We are the second largest trading partner of the United States.
Our bilateral trade goes to 300 to 330 billion dollars a year.
We're second only to Canada and so we have to make sure that
all this movement of goods between our two counties moves in a secure manner.
NARRATOR: Global security requires global effort, and INA
has worked hard to establish worldwide customs standards,
such as the Framework of Standards to Secure and Facilitate Global Trade.
BRENDA SMITH: The Framework of Standards is an initiative
that we took on through the World Customs Organization
to share best practices and identify opportunities for partnership,
customs to customs and customs to the trade, to improve supply chain security.
That initiative took about three years to develop and then propose officially,
and then in June of 2005, when it was formally proposed,
we had 125 of the 169 countries sign on.
Michel Danet, Former Secretary General, WCO, Brussels
Because for many people, they felt that security was going to kill facilitation
and that facilitation could not go on with these new security measures.
And the safe Framework of Standards is exactly that synthesis.
In fact, our idea that we want to build a chain where there is no weak link,
where in fact everybody will be able to trade
and everybody will be able to apply standards and common rules.
BRENDA SMITH: But now comes the hard part,
and that is working with those individual countries to implement.
NARRATOR: Many countries need expert assistance to bring their customs
and border management policies and practices up to the standard.
That expertise comes from INA's Training and Assistance Division.
IAN SAUNDERS: We're responsible for coordinating all of
CBP's short-term and long-term technical assistance programs all over the world,
essentially sharing our best practices and expertise with foreign counterparts.
NARRATOR: INA provides assistance only when invited to do so.
And the first step is for the Training and Assistance Division
to perform an assessment of the country's customs and security operations.
IAN SAUNDERS: Assessment is really the most
one of the most important first pieces of any program that we do.
It generally combines two elements.
One is information from the country.
Then what sort of evaluations have they done themselves?
What sort of visioning have they done about
where they might want to be, what their end goals might be?
But that documentary information is always supplemented
by us taking a visit to the country to actually observe their operations,
to get briefings from their senior managers,
to find out what's happening day to day.
NARRATOR: Based on the assessment, the Training and Assistance Division
develops a program tailored to the country's requirements.
Programs range from hosting a visit by the country's customs
or other border management officials,
so they can observe and learn CBP best practices,
to stationing CBP personnel overseas,
to provide training and advice and to help build necessary infrastructure.
IAN SAUNDERS: We've had a very active program
for several years with the Republic of Georgia.
One of the major deliverables that we've had under that program
is the construction of a port of entry
at a place called Red Bridge on the Georgian border.
When we started the project with Red Bridge,
there was essentially a very, very informal border crossing,
very high traffic, one road,
but very difficult to manage the flow
and know who was going in which direction for what reason.
We actually built a facility along the lines of
facilities that we have in the United States.
NARRATOR: Some countries are of special strategic importance to U.S. security,
and here INA's Foreign Operations Division plays a key role.
CHARLES STALLWORTH: What we're a model for
is the change in post 9/11 procedures as far as border security,
for trade relations and for customs and immigration procedures.
Those things have changed quite a bit
and so taking those lessons that we have learned
and offering them to our allies and to our partnering nations
and to those manufacturers who want their goods to come to the US,
so that we can continue to support what we call our extended border strategy.
NARRATOR: The backbone of the division
is its network of Attache and CBP Representatives
attached to U.S. embassies in countries around the world.
RENEE HARRIS ,CBP Attache, Mexico City
We are able to take our operational experience,
put it in a diplomatic setting
and really promote CBP's programs and initiatives to the world.
So organized crime, immigration, trade, security,
those are the issues that we deal with.
Those are the issues that are important.
Narrator: Innovative programs like CBP's Container Security Initiative,
the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism,
the Immigration Advisory Program
and the Proliferation Security Initiative
help coordinate security and trade efforts between the two countries.
LESLEY ANN BASSET, Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy, Mexico City
A lot of the things that we count on every day for our fast-food,
for our commodities, for Wal-Mart, for anything else,
comes across through Mexico and they make sure that gets there in time
and that's a very important part of our economy.
So we need free trade and we need safe trade
and what CBP does for us is make sure that both those things are possible.
JIM DICKMEYER, Public Affairs Officer, US Embassy, Mexico City
We talk about that filter, the filter that allows legitimate movement
of people and goods and screens out the bad guys.
That's a huge undertaking.
JUAN JOSE BRAVO, Administrator of Customs, Mexico City
CBP has helped us in several ways.
On one hand, on capacity building, on the people,
on training, on using best practices on sharing information.
They have donated some equipment for gamma rays and x-rays
and some other equipment to help us in checking on security, on control on trade.
So the relationship has been very strong.
I think we have advanced a lot in terms of security,
in terms of control of contraband, of fraud and money laundering.
And some other issues that are important for every country to control.
JOSE SANTIAGO VASCONSELOS Mexico Deputy Attorney General
for International Relations (In Spanish with English translation)
Our largest benefit has been our increased availability of knowledge and resources,
the ability to coordinate our operations more effectively
along both sides of the border.
SCOTT Danaher, Director Of Narcotics Affairs, US Embassy, Mexico City
CBP has given us the technological expertise that they bring to the game.
They have the experience.
What we try to do is to marry our investment with technology
that CBP has used and tested
because then they can help us with the training
and the tactical schemes on how to apply those equipment correctly.
NARRATOR: To many of our country's most important trading and security partners,
INA's Foreign Operations attaches are the face of CBP.
And they have earned the respect of many foreign governments,
especially for their work related to immigration and enforcement.
RENEE HARRIS: I think the effectiveness of this office is due to several things.
One is our ability to negotiate and develop bi-national security programs
such as the OASIS program or the Border Violence Program.
We also serve as a conduit of information and collaboration.
This information is sometimes instantaneous,
which it helps to mitigate security threats, risks to both of our governments.
We've established a rapport, relationships with the government of Mexico,
I think unparalleled in past history.
NARRATOR: Much of INA's work involves government-to-government partnerships.
But in fact, manufacturers, shippers, vendors, and importers
all play a far larger role in international trade than governments do,
and enlisting the business community's cooperation
is essential to securing any supply chain.
VERRUE: We want to be a hundred percent sure that
what we're doing is compatible with business facilitation.
We must have by our side the business community.
Otherwise, there is a risk of constructing solutions,
which might be very effective from a municipal perspective,
but almost impossible to implement from a business perspective.
NARRATOR: All INA divisions work in various ways with the private sector.
Engaging the private sector is a prime objective.
MATT VEGA, Senior Counsel, Federal Express Corporation
We believe in the globalization of the CBP initiatives.
So one of the things that we want to help CBP accomplish
is not only a worldwide standard for security and trade facilitation,
but also a worldwide standard of ethics and integrity to the process
and transparency to the process that will ensure its success.
FedEx operates in 218 countries,
either directly or indirectly through a GSP,
which we refer to as Global Service Provider.
So you're talking about very high-value goods being moved by air express.
And for us, the primary benefit of the Safe Framework
and other international standards for trade facilitation and security
is not only efficiency that will come by harmonization,
but also the practical trade barriers
that will be lowered as customs reform and modernization is carried out.
RENEE HARRIS: It's critical to open up overseas offices with the CBP mission
of interdiction, border security because we need to assist our global partners
in protecting their homelands and in turn that protects our homeland.
We need to maintain free commerce.
We need to maintain the ability for passengers to fly around the world
with a high degree of safety, security.
We need to work together with our global partners
to minimize the risk of international travel and increase international commerce.
NARRATOR: The only guarantee of homeland security lies in global security,
and building that security requires global partnerships.
BRENDA SMITH: We cannot increase security and increase facilitation by ourselves.
We have to have partnerships with the trade
to ensure that we're not shutting down travel or trade flows.
We have to have partnerships with our international colleagues.
IAN SAUNDERS: The message is one of partnership
and that the U.S. recognizes that the supply chain, the travel chain
has a number of locations and a number of entities that link into those networks.
And we all need to work together.
We all need to have the same motivation, to eliminate threats from that system.
NARRATOR: CBP's expertise and international stature
make it our nation's most effective agent for promoting those partnerships.
No other organization, public or private, has its capabilities,
experience, or technical know-how or its record of achievement.
But more remains to be done.
IAN SAUNDERS: I think there's more for us to do, certainly.
We've been fortunate enough in more recent years
to see more opportunities to do long-term engagements with countries,
so that we're imparting skills, we're building relationships
so that we're getting more candid information from people.
We're getting to the root of problems,
not necessarily just their visible symptoms.
But a lot of that comes over time, with relationships
and with the ability to continually engage, which takes funding.
NARRATOR: Global partnerships. Global security.
Essential investments for America's future.