The US Congress are about to pass a bill which proposes the scanning of all cargo carried in containers and moved by ships; it also proposed that these containers should be sealed before they leave for an American port, and the seal will need to be of a type approved by the US authorities. These requirements must be met within three years of enactment of the legislation (the rule itself to be issued by mid 2009) for containers moving from the larger ports (defined as those moving more than 75,000 TEUs per annum) and five years for those moving from smaller ports. Air freight is unsurprisingly also in the firing line (I make no apology for the deliberately dramatic metaphor), with measures proposed to create a system of inspections to ensure that 100 percent of the cargo carried on passenger planes is screened within three years. This system would be phased in over the next two to three years (i.e. by the end of fiscal year 2009).

With regard to the requirement for 100 percent scanning and sealing of maritime containers, technology does not yet exist that can do the job reliably and effectively; it would provide a false sense of security and would result in legitimate and safe cargo being delayed. Neither does the technology exist for screening air freight as one would passenger baggage.

In the absence of such technology, most in the air freight industry already know, but politicians seem unable as yet to grasp, that it is not practical to unwrap and inspect each shipment since such freight is normally delicate, time sensitive, of high value and, as such, physical handling is likely to result in contamination or irreparable damage.

Instead we should employ a multi-layered approach to the security of freight and freight transport, which combines practical and reasonable security measures employed by those parties in the supply chain along with information held by customs and other authorities in the normal course; put these together and identify the high risk cargo and undertake close inspection of that cargo, leaving the rest to move through unhindered: it is called risk assessment and it works!

This is the model of the European Authorised Economic Operator (AEO) scheme being introduced, the USA’s own C-TPAT (Customs-Trade Partnership against Terrorism) scheme, the World Customs Organization (WCO) framework for security in trade and transport. It is a model that industry can live with. There are questions over these schemes: what will the benefits be? The theory is that if they gain approval then they may benefit from reduced cargo inspections, fewer possible delays at the borders, and an all-round light touch from customs and security personnel. None of this has actually been detailed, so the questions remain. The converse of this is perhaps even more worrying for industry: failure to become validated could result in companies and their freight encountering far more security interrogation and screening, and more potential delays. This sounds suspiciously like having to prove innocence through an validation or else you must be presumed guilty, and trying to hide something.

Despite these questions, this approach is preferable to the giant queues that will form as every piece of freight must be screened whether it represents a risk or not.