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United Nations Environment Programme
  • Overview
  • Background
  • Participation

The Greening Customs for People, Planet and Prosperity: The Case of Waste Management is part of the MEA Side Events Pavilion at UNEA-6 (The Sixth session of the United Nations Environment Assembly). This side event aims to highlight the fundamental role played by enforcement agencies, primarily customs and border control officers, in promoting compliance to relevant chemicals and waste related multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) and related national legislation. The event will specifically reflect on the officers’ role in the management of wastes towards attaining the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. 

Date: Thursday, 29 February, 2024 

Time: 13:45 to 15:15 (UTC +03:00)

Venue: United Nations Office at Nairobi (UNON) Nairobi, Kenya  

Chemicals and waste such as pesticides, ozone depleting substances, plastic waste and electronic waste have grave impacts on our water, soil, atmospheric environments, and ultimately our health. Strong and capable border enforcement authorities are key to preventing the negative impacts resulting from illegal trade of these commodities, while maximizing the benefits of their trade, and contributing to international cooperation efforts to address the pollution crisis. The event will thus provide a forum to exchange on good customs enforcement and cooperation practices at national, transboundary and international levels.  Additionally, as outlined the United Nation’s General Assembly resolution 76/185 on preventing and combating crimes that affect the environment, cooperation at the national and international levels is vital to abating environmental crime. Accordingly, the event will highlight initiatives such as the Green Customs Initiative that are working with customs and MEA secretariats to promote such cooperation. 

After an introduction to the Green Customs Initiative, the event features a presentation on “Enforcement and illegal traffic under the Basel Convention, environmental crimes related to hazardous and other wastes, and results of Operation Demeter IX”. This will be followed by a panel session on “Preventing and combatting traffic in hazardous and other wastes: regional and national experiences”, drawing from practical experiences in different parts of the world.

More information on the UNEA - 6 App.

Participation is open to all and online participation is also available at the following Microsoft Teams link.

The side event will be held in English. 

Contact Ms. Jackline Wanjiru 

The GCI is a partnership between international entities to enhance the capacity of customs and border control officers to combat illegal trade in environmentally sensitive commodities, and to facilitate their legal trade. As a recognized forum that fosters necessary cooperation and coordination in addressing such crimes that affect the environment, the GCI secretariat works to support customs officers and regulatory authorities through providing capacity building trainings on implementation of multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs), at regional and national levels, exchange workshops between customs and regulatory authorities, as well as to support the development of national and regional green customs training curricula globally. By increasing knowledge about these environmental issues and relevant conventions and MEAs that apply to them, the GCI partnership enhances the skills and capacity of customs officers in MEAs’ implementation and enforcement.

For more information, please visit: Green Customs Website 

This event is co-organized by the United Nations Environment Programme (Green Customs Initiative Secretariat) and the Secretariat to the Basel Convention on Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal, Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides in International Trade, Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (BRS Secretariat).

Representatives from the World Customs Organization (WCO), Ministry of Environment of Uruguay, Basel and Stockholm conventions Regional Centre located in Senegal (BCRC-SCRC Senegal), Environmental Network for Optimizing Regulatory Compliance on Illegal Traffic (ENFORCE), Department of Environment of Malaysia, Kenya School of Revenue Administration, are also part of the panel.

The event is open to all, including customs practitioners, legal officers, environmental regulatory officers, representatives from waste management and trade sectors, and interested members of the public.

Fresh Water
Did you know?
Freshwater makes up only 2 per cent of all water.

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