KICUKIRO - Agents who are practicing without certified documents in the field of Clearing and Forwarding will not be allowed to operate by 2010, the Deputy Commissioner General of RRA Eugene Torero has said.

Torero said this on Tuesday during the official launch of the training program for the attainment of the Eastern Africa Customs Freight Forwarding Practicing Certificate(EACFFPC), at Le Prestige Hotel in Kigali.

The training was organized to facilitate the import-export trade by providing a body of professional freight forwarding agencies within Rwanda committed to meeting every client’s needs.

"It is very important to have qualified clearing agents and now that we are providing the training, it will require a certificate for anyone to operate in the field of customs clearing and forwarding by 2010,” Torero said.

He was also confident that after training the agents, the result would be an unrivalled quality of service within the region and beyond.

"Harmonizing training programs like this one is very important because the procedure during customs is the same and we should endeavor to do it perfectly like it is done elsewhere in the region,” he added.

The person in charge of the training program/head principal of RRA Training Institute, Lillian Rugambwa, says that it is very necessary for these agents to attain professional training and that they will be able to achieve this because of the way the curriculum has been translated.

"We have translated the curriculum into French for those who do not understand English,” Rugambwa said.

While giving his speech, the Vice President of the East Africa Freight Forwarders Association, Bosco Rusagara, said that this is the first professionally recognized training program for clearing agents in the region.

"It is the first in the region and it will equip trainees with necessary skills, competences and values that are desirable in customs clearing and freight forwarding,” he said.

He added that acquiring professional forwarders is important because Rwanda faces many challenges as a landlocked country with no access to seaport and is a country with a smaller industrial base in comparison to the larger EAC states.

"It is important that when importers have completed the long journey from the seaport they should find a friendly and professional pool of custom agents providing world-class management service,” Rusagara said.   

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