The World Customs Organisation (WCO) has released its 173-page Study Report 2018, on “Illicit Financial Flows via Trade Mis-invoicing”, which responds to the request from the G20 leaders’ communiqué September 2016 to the WCO.
The report has been prepared in collaboration with experts and scholars from the WCO, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Global Financial Integrity (GFI), academia and Customs administrations.
The research revealed significantly high estimates of Illicit Financial Flows (IFFs) via Trade Mis-invoicing (TM). In particular, the United Nations’ “High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa” argued that Africa lost over U$50 billion annually from illicit financial outflows, which exceeds levels of official development assistance to the continent.