World Customs Organization (WCO)

The origins of the World Customs Organization (WCO) go back to the Committee for European Economic Co-operation which emerged from the Marshall Plan (European Recovery Program) (as laid down in the speech by US Secretary of State George C Marshall ‘European Initiative Essential to Economic Recovery’ XVI [1947] DeptStBull 1159–60) and sought to develop an economic recovery programme and supervise the distribution of aid. In 1947 the 13 European governments represented in the Committee for European Economic Co-operation agreed to set up a Study Group vested with the mandate to examine the possibility of establishing one or more inter-European customs unions, based on the principles of the GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade [1947 and 1994]).