The National Stakeholders’ validation meetings for the updated curriculum for Freight Forwarders was completed in the East African region on Friday last week. Burundi, Kenya and Rwanda were among the first countries to conduct the validation while Ugandan and Tanzanian stakeholders completed the exercise at the end of last week.
All industry stakeholders have given their inputs. Key areas of discussion included course durations, cost of training, accreditation in countries and the region, assessments and mode of delivery.
All suggestions and proposals from stakeholders will be considered before the curriculum is validated by the Curriculum Implementation Committee (CIC). Development of training materials will then follow before the rollout.
Stakeholder validation is a key procedure and a normal standard in curriculum development and accreditation, after which the Curriculum Implementation committee (CIC) will take over the process.
In February, the National Curriculum implementation Committees (NCICs) in all the East Africa Community (EAC) countries gave their input on the curriculum. NCIC members provided their technical input on the updated curriculum.
The new curriculum is a competence based one and will offer both certificate and Diploma programs; with additional Modules including Warehousing, Communication skills, Continuing Professional Development (CPD), Practical Experience among other areas.
The Federation of East African Freight Forwarders Associations (FEAFFA), the umbrella body of clearing agents, in collaboration with other industry stakeholders is coordinating validation exercise in close collaboration with the nationals associations of customs agents, Training institutions of revenue authorities in East Africa and other key representative of clearing and freight forwarding industry in the region.
The updating of the curriculum for freight forwarders is part of the larger East African Community Logistics skills enhancement programme supported by the Dutch government through Trademark East Africa (TMEA).
A baseline survey conducted by TMEA assessed the appropriateness of the East Africa Customs and Freight Forwarding Practicing Certificate (EACFFPC) in addressing the needs and requirements of modern-day customs agents, freight forwarders and warehousing operations from the perspective of the employers, customers, and principals.
Other areas of focus were on bench marking the curriculum in its current form with other professional training and capacity building initiatives in other regions.
The curriculum update is building on the existing EACFFPC program by introducing a higher level of learning.
Since 2007, when the EACFFPC training programme was started, over 6000 customs agents and freight forwarders have qualified from the program in the region.
