Contribution by: Dr Portia Ndlovu.

The international trade world knows that one of the mandates of the ICC is to bring more harmony to the process of selling, financing and the movement of goods in international sales. Even so this process can be extremely time consuming and expensive. So, it is fantastic to hear about the standardized, internationally recognized customs document that has been described the ICC as working very much like a ‘passport’ but for goods. This means that up to one-year, certain goods (with the exception of perishables and goods destined for repair of processing) can used this trusted method to travel to multiple destinations, tax and duty free up to one year. South Africa is one of the current 87 ATA Carnets nations, therefore this process certainly opens up room for more participation in international markets without surprise fees that may potentially seriously overwhelm the overhead of any size business in a dynamic world economy. So yes, it is now possible to safely speed goods through customs.

Ref: https://www.atacarnet.com/carnet-countries

https://iccwbo.org/business-solutions/ata-carnet/