At the request of the European Commission, Prof. Wolffgang gave a statement on the draft of the new Union Customs Code to the Customs Union Working Party of the European Council last week. He began with a holistic understanding of the customs union, which, in addition to the internal market itself, also includes, for example, the protection of financial, social and environmental interests of the Union and the member states. He then briefly presented the individual reform initiatives of various EU players for the years 2016 to 2023 to reorganise customs law, before finally moving on to the reform package for 2023. To this end, he compared the individual objectives of the UCC reform – such as increasing the transparency of supply chains and thus control – with the actual content of the reform package – such as the establishment of an EU Customs Data Hub. At the end of this comparison, Professor Wolffgang drew a positive balance on the reform proposal, but pointed out that a lot of detailed work was still needed. Following the favourable opinion, he countered the concerns of the member states by arguing that in times of geopolitical crises, only a strong European Union would be able to compete with China and the USA. A strong customs union is an indispensable prerequisite for this.