Economic governance of customs information

Compliance, SAFE and information security of the customs broker: from the Brazilian case to the institutional models of Mercosur.

Summary

This article examines customs information as an economic and regulatory asset in foreign trade systems guided by risk management, digitalization, and international standards. Using the Brazilian case as a starting point, it investigates the customs broker as an interface professional, focusing on informational qualifications, traceability, and compliance through evidence. The analysis adopts an economic-institutional approach and compares, in a functional and non-exhaustive manner, Mercosur models: Paraguay and Uruguay, which maintain mandatory or prescriptive professional layers for customs brokers, and Argentina, which, following Decree No. 70/2023, offers a critical perspective on flexibility, data, and accountability. The SAFE Framework is discussed as a standard for security, facilitation, and Customs-Business cooperation, promoting supply chains composed of secure, compliant, and auditable operators, without automatic conversion into domestic regulations. It is concluded that, in digital customs, automation does not eliminate professional diligence, but rather shifts its relevance towards data governance, auditability, incentives and the quality of customs information. 

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Summary

1. Introduction

2. Customs information as an economic and regulatory asset
  2.1 Information asymmetry, adverse selection and signaling in the customs chain

3. The Brazilian case: functional matrix, digital customs and interface professional
  3.1 The Brazilian institutional gap: professional conformity, ethical governance and professional advice

4. Institutional models in Mercosur: Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina

5. International Facilitation and Security FrameworksSAFE, OAS/AEO, Mercosur Agreement, European Union and Article 4.14

6. Algorithmic governance and customs information managementProportional explainability, auditability, and data accountability

7. International standards and comparative modelsCTPAT, ARM Brazil–United States, Customs Brokers Guidelines and comparative analysis

8. Final considerations

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1.Introdução

Contemporary customs increasingly relies on information. Physical inspection of goods remains relevant, but risk selection, the predictability of legitimate flows, and supply chain security depend, to a growing degree, on structured data, interoperability, institutional cooperation, and verifiable controls. In this context, customs information ceases to be a mere documentary input and becomes an economic and regulatory asset. 

This article examines this transformation from an economic and institutional perspective. Its central thesis is that, in systems driven by risk management, digitalization, interoperability, and international standards, the quality of customs information affects predictability, the intensity of control, transaction costs, risk selection, supply chain security, auditability, and institutional trust between private operators and the Customs Administration. 

The text adopts an analytical stance favorable to the economic and institutional recognition of customs brokers. This stance is not presented as a corporate defense or an associational demand. It is formulated as an academic hypothesis: in data-driven customs, the existence of a qualified professional stratum can operate as a mechanism for reducing uncertainty, mitigating information asymmetries, signaling quality, traceability, and compliance through evidence.

Brazil is the central case. The trajectory of the Brazilian customs broker reveals a historical role as an interface between commerce and the State, reconfigured by digital customs, the Single Portal, the DUIMP (Single Import Declaration), the Product Catalog, the LPCO (Limited Customs Brokerage Program), and the AEO (Authorized Economic Operator) Program. This trajectory combines a historical framework, operational density, and recent technological modernization. 

Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina are discussed in this article as distinct institutional models. Paraguay and Uruguay maintain structures in which the customs broker holds a mandatory or prescriptive central role. Argentina, following Decree 70/2023, offers a liberalizing counterpoint and a critical research hypothesis regarding flexibility, data, and accountability. Regional regulatory uniformity is not assumed. 

The research problem can be formulated as follows: to what extent can the professional layer represented by the customs broker be understood, in light of institutional economics and information governance, as a mechanism for reducing uncertainty, mitigating information asymmetry, signaling technical quality, auditability and compliance in risk-oriented customs systems; and how do the models of Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina put this hypothesis into tension within Mercosur?

The hypothesis adopted is that, in data-driven customs systems that manage risk and adhere to international standards, the involvement of a qualified professional layer can reduce systemic verification costs, improve the quality of customs information, mitigate information asymmetries, create incentives for compliance, and contribute to regulatory confidence. The Brazilian case provides the main focus of the analysis; Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina serve as regional institutional contrasts. 

The study adopts a qualitative approach, employing historical-institutional, institutional-economic, normative, and comparative-functional methods. Economic theory structures the argument: North's work helps to understand institutions, uncertainty, and predictability; Coase and Williamson, transaction costs and governance; Akerlof, Stiglitz, and Spence, information asymmetry, adverse selection, and signaling; Pigou and Samuelson, externalities and the collective dimension of information; Shavell and Becker, incentives, responsibility, and enforcement; and Ostrom, polycentric governance. 

This article presents a preliminary excerpt from a broader academic investigation into the historical formation, economic function, and institutional repositioning of the Brazilian customs broker within the context of digital customs and international customs information governance. Topics such as professional advice, professional compliance, Mercosur regional models, the Brazil-United States Regional Trade Agreement, CTPAT, and data accountability are addressed here in a way that supports the central hypothesis, without claiming to be exhaustive.

The negative delimitation is equally important. The article does not claim that the customs broker is a public authority, exercises police power, replaces customs administrations, decides on risk management, certifies Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) status, parameters operations, is responsible for public algorithms, or is a universal guarantor of the supply chain. It examines their economic and institutional function in the assessment of customs information.

2. Customs information as an economic and regulatory asset

Customs information is not merely data transmitted to the State. It is an economic and regulatory asset because it influences risk allocation, the intensity of control, operational predictability, the cost of auditing, and institutional trust between private operators and the Customs Administration.

North teaches that institutions reduce uncertainty and structure expectations of behavior (North, 1990). Customs, in this sense, is a central institution in international trade: it organizes the movement of goods between jurisdictions, defines entry and exit conditions, monitors risks, and assigns legal consequences to data, documents, and declarations. Without reliable information, the customs institution operates with greater uncertainty. 

Coase demonstrated that economic organization cannot be understood without considering transaction costs (Coase, 1937). Williamson expanded on this interpretation by linking governance structures to the costs of coordination, verification, opportunism, and enforcement (Williamson, 1985). In international trade, incomplete or poorly rated information increases costs related to verification, rework, subsequent audits, corrections, litigation, and clearance time. Therefore, the quality of customs data is not merely a formal matter; it is an economic variable. 

Customs information also has a collective dimension. Pigou's theory allows us to understand negative externalities when the costs of a particular action are passed on to third parties (Pigou, 1920). Samuelson's theory helps identify goods and benefits of a collective nature (Samuelson, 1954). Deficient customs data do not only affect a single transaction. They can contaminate risk profiles, statistics, origin controls, post-market audits, international cooperation, and the perceived reliability of legitimate trade flows. 

Customs information governance is polycentric. Ostrom's concept of complex institutional arrangements helps to understand systems in which multiple agents produce, interpret, and monitor information (OSTROM, 1990; 2005). Customs, operators, brokers, carriers, regulatory bodies, digital systems, and international partners all participate, with different roles, in the same information chain. 

The economic analysis of liability adds a normative layer. Shavell shows that liability regimes should induce diligent behavior without generating costs exceeding the harm they aim to prevent (Shavell, 1984). Becker allows us to interpret sanctions and incentives based on the probability of detection and the costs of non-compliance (Becker, 1968). In customs matters, professional liability should incentivize diligence, vigilance, and preservation of evidence, but not automatic imputation.

These categories shift the debate away from the role of the customs broker. The economically relevant question is not merely whether their intervention increases or reduces private costs. The question is whether their performance, when technically qualified, reduces uncertainty, improves quality signals, organizes scattered information, decreases negative externalities, and helps Customs manage risk on a more reliable basis. 

🟦2.1 Information asymmetry, adverse selection and signaling in the customs chain

Information asymmetry is one of the key economic factors for understanding the contemporary role of the customs broker. In international trade, relevant information is dispersed among various parties. The importer knows the commercial decision and the economic purpose of the transaction; the exporter knows the product, its composition, its origin, and its supply conditions; the carrier knows the logistics; the relevant authorities have specific jurisdiction over health, environmental, technical, or strategic risks; and the Customs Administration receives the declaration and the documents that allow it to select, control, and audit.

None of these actors, in isolation, possesses all the information necessary to create a technically sound customs declaration. The digital system processes data, but it cannot, on its own, determine whether the private information was properly formatted. Automation increases speed and scale, but it does not replace the quality of data formation.

Akerlof observes that when quality is not fully visible, the market can be exposed to adverse selection (Akerlof, 1970). Operators focused solely on lower costs may prefer weak declaration structures, less capable of identifying inconsistencies in classification, value, origin, licensing, technical description, or customs regime. The immediate private gain can then translate into a subsequent systemic cost: demands, corrections, additional audits, legal actions, litigation, and a loss of predictability.

Stiglitz expands on this diagnosis by demonstrating that economic and public decisions are rarely made with perfect information (Stiglitz, 2000). Modern customs, even with digital systems, algorithms, and databases, makes decisions based on the information that enters the system. If the data is incomplete, contradictory, or poorly classified, risk management operates on an imperfect informational basis. 

Spence makes a crucial contribution to professional interpretation. In environments of information asymmetry, quality signals matter (Spence, 1973). The customs broker's role should not be viewed merely as formal intermediation, but as a potential mechanism for technical signaling to the market and the government. Professional qualifications, technical expertise, records, accountability, ethical standards, due diligence, and documented evidence can all function as institutional signals of reliability. 

This interpretation does not transform the customs broker into a universal guarantor of the operation. Their economic function is more precise: to reduce asymmetries, organize dispersed private information, identify reasonably verifiable inconsistencies, communicate risks, preserve evidence, and assess the information to be submitted to Customs. Professional responsibility, therefore, must be modulated by the scope of the action, the control of information, the concrete possibility of verification, the duty to alert, the causal link, negligence, intent, and the documentation of due diligence.

Information asymmetry also explains the relevance of the Mercosur institutional models examined later. Paraguay and Uruguay maintain structures in which the customs broker remains a mandatory or required professional layer of the customs clearance process. Argentina, by relaxing the mandatory centrality of this professional layer, offers a critical research hypothesis: the reduction of institutional qualification signals may require compensatory mechanisms of control, certification, auditability, and accountability to avoid information dispersion, adverse selection, and increased systemic oversight costs. 

3. The Brazilian case: functional matrix, digital customs and interface professional

The Brazilian case remains central to this article because it combines historical framework, operational density, and recent digital transformation. The Decree of June 7, 1809, issued by Dom João, then Prince Regent, created the office of dispatcher for vessels departing from the port of Rio de Janeiro. Recent literature identifies in this act a functional interface between commerce and administration, linked to expedited processing, document organization, and the reduction of uncertainty in maritime traffic (FERREIRA; FAZOLO, 2025). 

Historical caution is necessary to avoid anachronism. The article does not claim that the current profession emerged in its entirety in 1809. It argues that the function of facilitating communication between private information and public decision-making has historical roots. This framework transforms over time, passes through different legal regimes, and culminates in digital customs as a problem of information, evidence, and trust. 

In present-day Brazil, the Customs Regulations structure the administration of customs activities, oversight, control, and taxation of foreign trade operations (BRAZIL, 2009). The incorporation of the Trade Facilitation Agreement and the Revised Kyoto Convention reinforced the logic of simplification, risk management, and institutional cooperation (BRAZIL, 2018; 2020).

The Single Portal, DUIMP, Product Catalog, and LPCO illustrate the transition from document to data. The customs declaration ceases to be a mere piece of paper and begins to operate as a set of structured, reusable, and auditable information. In this environment, errors in description, classification, origin, value, product attributes, or licenses are not isolated defects. They can affect system integrations, risk controls, and automated decisions. 

The Brazilian customs broker acts as the point of contact. They receive private information, commercial documents, instructions from the economic operator, product data, and regulatory requirements. Their role is not to make decisions for Customs, but to contribute to the development of more technically sound information, identify reasonably identifiable inconsistencies, organize evidence, and document the due diligence performed. 

The research by Morini and Inácio Júnior is used here as complementary Brazilian empirical evidence. Their results indicate that economic operators attribute importance to elements such as trust, quality, consistency, experience, conformity, knowledge, and the difficulty of fully replacing the customs broker with automation (MORINI; INÁCIO JÚNIOR, 2024). These findings do not prove the regional hypothesis, but they do support it.

Recent literature on risk management and artificial intelligence in import clearance reinforces the centrality of data and automated control (REIS, 2024). Digital transformation does not eliminate the technical intermediary; it alters the scope of their due diligence. What previously focused on documentation now shifts toward data structures, traceability, evidence, and information governance.

🟦3.1. The Brazilian institutional gap: professional compliance, ethical governance and professional advice

In the Brazilian case, the institutional gap takes on its own distinct characteristics. Customs brokers play a significant role in the creation and qualification of customs information, but they are not covered by a specific government program for professional compliance, information security, or recognition as a technical link in the secure supply chain. The Brazilian Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) Program builds trust around certified economic operators, but it does not specifically include customs brokers as information interface professionals. 

This absence does not eliminate the operational relevance of the profession. On the contrary, it highlights an institutional asymmetry: the customs system increasingly relies on qualified data, traceability, evidence, and risk management, but still lacks a specific public framework to assess, recognize, or induce verifiable standards of professional compliance for customs brokers.

The gap becomes more apparent when compared to the SAFE/AEO rationale. If a secure supply chain depends on identifiable, compliant, auditable operators subject to verifiable trust criteria, the lack of a specific mechanism for professionals involved in customs data collection constitutes an institutional problem. This is not about automatically including customs brokers in the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) program, but rather about recognizing that there is an insufficiently developed regulatory framework. 

The discussion about a professional council must be understood within this same economic and institutional framework. It is not about displacing the powers of the Customs Administration, nor about granting customs brokers police powers, state certification, or the public prerogative of validating transactions. It is about examining whether a private profession, whose actions have significant effects on the quality of information submitted to Customs, requires its own institution for registration, guidance, ethical oversight, discipline, and continuing education.

From North's perspective, institutions reduce uncertainty and structure behavioral expectations. From Spence's perspective, professional standards, registration, continuing education, and ethical discipline function as quality signals in an environment of information asymmetry. From Williamson's perspective, a clearer professional architecture can reduce costs associated with coordination, opportunism, rework, litigation, and enforcement.

The Brazilian gap, therefore, lies not in the absence of a practical function for customs brokers, but in the inadequacy of an institutional architecture capable of recognizing, promoting, and monitoring professional standards compatible with digital customs, the SAFE framework, data governance, and evidence-based compliance. Any future professional compliance programs should be treated as future methodological hypotheses, not as state certification, a parallel Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) program, or a substitute for the Brazilian Federal Revenue Service (Receita Federal do Brasil).

4. Institutional models in Mercosur: Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina

Joining Mercosur requires abandoning any presumption of uniformity. Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina do not replicate the Brazilian model. Nor do they represent a homogeneous regional experience. What they offer is more useful: three distinct institutional responses to the same economic problem—who qualifies, tracks, and is responsible for customs information. 

In Paraguay, the Customs Code, Law No. 2.422/2004, Article 22, establishes the mandatory use of a licensed customs broker in customs operations (Paraguay, 2004). Furthermore, Law No. 220/93 regulates minimum professional fees for customs brokers (Paraguay, 1993). The Paraguayan model preserves a formally protected professional sector, linked to licensing, mandatory participation, and minimum remuneration.

In Uruguay, the Customs Code of the Eastern Republic of Uruguay (CAROU), Law No. 19.276/2014, recognizes the customs broker as a private individual, an auxiliary of commerce and of the public customs function, authorized to carry out procedures and formalities related to customs destinations and operations (URUGUAY, 2014). The system maintains mandatory intervention, authorization, professional requirements, and specific legal exceptions.

The Uruguayan model is interesting because it combines a private nature with an auxiliary function in relation to public customs activity. This combination avoids two misunderstandings: the customs broker is neither an authority nor an irrelevant actor. Their involvement serves as a key element in the technical organization of customs clearance and the relationship between private operators and the National Customs Directorate.

Argentina followed a different path. Decree No. 70/2023 modified the logic of the Customs Code by allowing individuals or legal entities to manage the clearance and destination of goods themselves or through an authorized representative (ARGENTINA, 2023a). AFIP General Resolution No. 5.472/2023 created Importer/Exporter and Customs Broker/Declarant profiles (ARGENTINA, 2023b). ARCA General Resolution No. 5.818/2026 recognized the elimination of the mandatory registration in the Customs Brokers Registry to act as a broker, while maintaining technical certifications for certain roles (ARGENTINA, 2026a).

This change should not be analyzed through a judgment of political expediency, but rather by its potential effects on incentives, data quality, and systemic costs. Relaxing the professional centrality requirement can simplify formal access to the system. However, if not accompanied by equivalent compensatory controls, it can also increase information dispersion, reduce institutional quality signals, and shift costs to subsequent auditing.

The regulatory differences between Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina do not allow us to conclude, without empirical data, that one model necessarily produces better customs information than another. It does, however, allow us to formulate a relevant economic and institutional hypothesis: models that preserve authorization, professional intervention, and technical responsibility tend to maintain an institutional layer of qualification and traceability of customs data; more liberalized models require equivalent compensatory controls to avoid information dispersion, adverse selection, loss of auditability, and increased systemic audit costs. 

This comparison repositions Brazil. The country is neither isolated nor serves as a model for others. Brazil appears as an example of high customs digitization, with its own gap in professional compliance. Paraguay and Uruguay show models of institutional preservation of the professional stratum. Argentina challenges this hypothesis by taking the opposite approach, liberalizing intermediation and shifting the discussion toward controls, profiles, and ex post accountability. 

5. SAFE, OAS/AEO, Mercosur Agreement, European Union and Article 4.14

National models must be interpreted within an international context of facilitation, security, and risk management. The World Customs Organization's SAFE Framework should not be understood merely as a matrix of state controls. Its rationale is broader: to structure an international trade chain that is simultaneously secure, predictable, and facilitated, in which Customs, economic operators, and other relevant actors operate under minimum standards of security, compliance, cooperation, ethics, and risk management (WORLD CUSTOMS ORGANIZATION, 2025). 

This reading is crucial to the present article. The SAFE framework is based on the premise that Customs cannot physically control everything with equal intensity. Legitimate trade must flow predictably, while public resources are concentrated on higher-risk operations. For this to happen, Customs needs advance data, identifiable operators, demonstrable controls, risk management, and cooperation with the private sector.

The SAFE Framework does not transform customs brokers into security authorities, nor does it transfer to them police powers, state certification, or decision-making authority belonging to the Customs Administration. However, the SAFE Framework encourages relevant links in the international supply chain to organize themselves as secure, reliable, and compliant operators, subject to verifiable criteria, demonstrable controls, and benefits commensurate with the level of trust placed in them. 

In this context, Brazilian customs brokers and those from other Mercosur countries should not be analyzed solely as formal intermediaries in the customs clearance process. The economic and institutional issue is more precise: if modern customs depends on advance data, risk management, traceability, and cooperation with the private sector, it becomes relevant to examine who participates in the creation, qualification, and preservation of the information that feeds this system. 

SAFE 2025 reinforces this conclusion by including specific benefits for customs brokers within the AEO environment. This provision does not mandate the automatic inclusion of Brazilian customs brokers in a national Authorized Economic Operator program, as the specific structure depends on domestic legislation, customs policy, and administrative decisions. Even so, it confirms that customs brokers are not an outsider in the international chain of trust. On the contrary, when they meet specific criteria, they can be recognized as technical actors in compliance, information security, and facilitation. 

The indirect legal weight of the SAFE framework does not mean it automatically becomes a binding domestic law. SAFE remains an international standard of the World Customs Organization. Its relevance stems from its common language, conventional cross-references, and its use as a technical parameter for security, facilitation, risk management, and Customs-Business cooperation.

The Mercosur-European Union Agreement adds a regional layer of convergence. In Brazil, the agreement was approved by Legislative Decree No. 14 of March 17, 2026, and promulgated by Decree No. 12.953 of April 28, 2026 (BRAZIL, 2026a; 2026b). Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay also approved their respective national instruments (ARGENTINA, 2026b; PARAGUAY, 2026; URUGUAY, 2026). Chapter 4 of the agreement incorporates language on facilitation, risk management, cooperation, authorized operators, security, and transparency.

Article 4.14, which deals with customs brokers, must be interpreted precisely. The provision does not create a professional reserve nor does it mandate the use of customs brokers. Its importance lies in preventing the regulatory invisibility of customs intermediaries: Parties must publish their measures regarding the use of customs brokers, and any licensing rules must be transparent, non-discriminatory, and proportionate.

The economic consequences of this architecture are clear. The debate about customs brokers and customs agents should not be trapped by the choice between market reservation and absolute liberalization. It must shift towards data quality, trust, auditability, incentives, and the role of identifiable private actors in secure and compliant supply chains. 

6. Algorithmic governance and customs information management. Proportional explainability, auditability and data accountability

Customs digitization should not be understood as merely automating declaration procedures. As in other regulated sectors, algorithmic systems and data-driven decisions are reshaping expectations, responsibilities, and institutional arrangements. In the customs field, this shifts the focus from professional diligence to data quality, source traceability, decision auditability, and evidence preservation.

Vainzof's contribution is useful in avoiding a naive interpretation of explainability. Transparency does not necessarily mean complete openness of the algorithm, as technical secrets, sensitive criteria, and risks of neutralizing control may exist. The key is to explain the logic of the decision to the necessary extent, indicate relevant factors, allow for review, and preserve legitimate strategic assets (VAINZOF, 2026).

Algorithmic customs governance does not require comprehensive disclosure of risk criteria. It does, however, require proportionate auditability: preservation of data sources, recording of human intervention, decision traces, the possibility of reviewing inconsistencies, and distinction between declarant error, privately sourced documentary error, systemic failure, and automated administrative decision.

Technology guides, cross-references patterns, and expands the scope of control, but it does not eliminate the need for human oversight and accountability. In customs clearance, this point is crucial: the customs broker is not responsible for the public algorithm, but rather for their diligence in handling the data they receive, assess, flag, record, and transmit.

Digitalization shifts professional responsibility to a more complex terrain. Incorrect data can result from incomplete client information, a documentary error by the exporter, inconsistencies in publicly available databases, a system integration failure, automated parameterization, or an act attributable to the intermediary itself. Therefore, assigning responsibility cannot be automatic. It must consider informational control, the scope of the contract, the concrete possibility of verification, the duty to alert, causal link, negligence, intent, and evidence of due diligence.

The customs broker is not responsible for the algorithm, the publicly available parameters, the system design, or automated decisions by the Administration. Responsibility, when the legal and factual conditions are met, lies with their own diligence, actions within their technical control, relevant omissions within their scope, and any warning failures that could have been reasonably identified.

Economic analysis recommends caution both towards deregulation that dissolves professional standards and towards regulation that creates disproportionate costs and adverse incentives. A professional compliance framework should reduce uncertainty and qualify customs data, not produce artificial barriers, litigation, or costs that exceed the risks it seeks to mitigate. This warning aligns with the idea of ​​the regulatory boomerang effect, according to which poorly calibrated regulations can generate consequences opposite to those intended (YEUNG, 2026).

This point addresses the Brazilian gap. The challenge is not to create administrative rigidity for the profession, but to build proportionate parameters for continuing education, ethics, traceability, information security, human review, and modulated accountability. Algorithmic governance requires controls, but intelligent controls.

7. CTPAT, ARM Brazil–United States, Customs Brokers Guidelines and comparative analysis

The North American experience is not presented as a normative model for Mercosur, but as functional evidence of an international trend: customs enforcement based on information, identification of the importer, due diligence, chain security, demonstrable minimum controls and proportional responsibility of technical intermediaries. 

The North American relevance is even greater for the Brazilian case because Brazil and the United States already have a Mutual Recognition Agreement between their trusted trader programs. Brazil's Federal Revenue Service (Receita Federal do Brasil) reports that the Brazil-United States MRA demonstrates the compatibility of Brazil's Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) program with CTPAT, the U.S. supply chain security program (Brazil, 2022). This brings the discussion closer to the Brazilian institutional level: the SAFE logic of functional equivalence, recognition, benefits, trust, and supply chain security is not merely an abstract concept, but is already integrated into Brazil's bilateral customs cooperation with the hemisphere's largest economy.

The SAFE Framework recommends that customs administrations pursue mutual recognition of AEO status between programs as a way to enhance supply chain security and harmonize procedures. However, the equivalence suggested by SAFE should be understood in a functional and programmatic sense, not as automatic legal identity between national professional categories, licenses, or regimes. Mutual recognition depends on verifiable criteria, validations, controls, program compatibility, and decisions by the competent customs administrations.

The Brazil-United States Regulatory Agreement (RAA) does not automatically include Brazilian customs brokers in the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) program, nor does it legally equate them with U.S. customs brokers. Even so, it demonstrates that Brazil already operates within an international architecture of trust based on security, compliance, auditability, and program compatibility. In this context, it is legitimate to investigate whether customs brokers, as professionals involved in the creation and qualification of customs information, should be analyzed based on their own criteria of compliance, information security, traceability, and regulatory trust.

The issue, therefore, is not about importing the North American model or turning the customs broker into a security authority. It is about recognizing that, if the SAFE framework recommends functional equivalence between trusted programs and if Brazil already has a Mutual Recognition Agreement (MRA) with the United States, the debate about the Brazilian customs broker should not remain restricted to the formal intermediation of customs clearance. It must be repositioned in the areas of data quality, documented due diligence, information security, and secure supply chain governance.

The Executive Order, Strengthening Customs Enforcement, of June 3, 2026, and the corresponding White House Fact Sheet reinforce a customs enforcement approach based on importer identification, good standing criteria, information requirements, due diligence, and controls over customs brokers, freight forwarders, and other supply chain actors (United States, 2026a; 2026b). CTPAT and its Minimum Security Criteria, for their part, demonstrate the centrality of demonstrable controls, supply chain security, and risk assessment (U.S. Customs and Border Protection, 2026b; 2026c).

The World Customs Organization's Customs Brokers Guidelines confirm that a customs broker can be understood as a technical intermediary subject to ethical, training, accountability, cooperation with Customs, and professional performance standards (WORLD CUSTOMS ORGANIZATION, 2018). This interpretation does not impose a single model. It offers an international framework for discussing the qualifications, compliance, and trustworthiness of customs brokers.

The usefulness of this comparison is economic. CTPAT, ARM, Guidelines, and international standards function as institutional signals of trust. They do not prove that the Brazilian model should copy the North American one. They do, however, allow us to formulate a more sophisticated question: if modern security and facilitation programs recognize trusted private actors, why should the professional layer that helps shape customs information remain invisible as an object of compliance and governance?

8. Final considerations

Customs information has become an institutional infrastructure of contemporary foreign trade. In systems oriented towards risk management, SAFE, Authorized Economic Operator (AEO), interoperability, artificial intelligence, and international cooperation, customs data is not an accessory. It is the raw material for public decision-making, proportionate oversight, and the facilitation of legitimate trade. 

The article did not demonstrate, nor did it intend to demonstrate, regional regulatory uniformity. Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina present distinct architectures. Brazil offers the central case of the transition from document to data, with a relevant profession and an institutional gap in professional compliance. Paraguay and Uruguay indicate models for preserving the professional layer. Argentina offers critical research hypotheses on data flexibility and governance.

The Brazilian gap warrants attention. Customs brokers participate in the preparation and qualification of information submitted to Customs, but they are not covered by their own government program for professional compliance, information security, or recognition as a technical link in the secure supply chain. Nor is there a professional council with the legal authority for registration, guidance, ethical oversight, discipline, and continuing education. This void does not authorize the transfer of public powers, but it does justify academic debate on professional governance. 

The SAFE Framework, the Authorized Economic Operator (AEO) program, the Mercosur Agreement, the European Union, Article 4.14, and the Brazil-United States Mutual Agreement reinforce the international relevance of this issue without creating automatic domestic obligations. The SAFE Framework does not transform customs brokers into security authorities, but it does demonstrate that secure supply chains depend on reliable operators, demonstrable controls, cooperation, ethics, and risk management. The recognition of customs brokers within the SAFE/AEO framework confirms that the technical intermediary is not an external component of the international chain of trust. 

Algorithmic governance imposes an additional agenda. When Customs opts for structured data, automated cross-checks, and risk profiling, the need to discuss auditability, proportionate explainability, data accountability, duty to alert, professional scope, and limits of imputation increases. Automation does not eliminate due diligence; it shifts due diligence toward data, evidence, traceability, and human review.

The regional comparison suggests that professional intermediation should not be analyzed merely as a private cost or administrative formality. In certain institutional arrangements, it can function as a mechanism for reducing uncertainty, signaling quality, mitigating information asymmetry, reducing systemic oversight costs, and protecting regulatory confidence. This is the hypothesis put forward by the Brazilian case, and one that Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina help to challenge at the regional level.

The future agenda should not seek corporate privilege or the transfer of public powers. It should explore proportionate mechanisms for qualification, ethics, traceability, continuing education, and professional accountability capable of strengthening regulatory trust without weakening Customs' authority. The question is not whether the customs broker should replace the State. The question is whether a digital, data-driven Customs system can do without professional institutions capable of evaluating the information that feeds its own regulatory intelligence.

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Highlighted

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BRAZIL. Decree No. 10.276, of March 13, 2020. Promulgates the revised text of the International Convention for the Simplification and Harmonization of Customs Regimes, the Revised Quioto Convention. Brasília, DF: Presidency of the Republic, 2020. 

BRAZIL. Brazilian Federal Revenue. Brazil-United States Mutual Reconciliation Agreement. Brasilia, DF, 2022. 

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