key: cord-0059342-wqk6ku0j
authors: Mohanty, S. K.; Dash, Priyadarshi; Kaushik, Vaibhav; Kashyap, Bhaskar
title: Potential for India–Japan Cooperation in Trade Facilitation in Africa
date: 2020-07-24
journal: Asia-Africa Growth Corridor
DOI: 10.1007/978-981-15-5550-3_5
sha: 7c3b291159b94caba33e6fb2c5a9b360e508633a
doc_id: 59342
cord_uid: wqk6ku0j

Trade facilitation infrastructure and systems in many countries of Asia and Africa are still far from the global benchmarks. Regardless of the level of trade facilitation, most of those countries have registered significant growth in trade over the years, particularly the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) countries. With rapid trade liberalization intra-regional trade is growing in the IORA region. AAGC can lend support to deepening trade integration in Indo-Pacific region approximated by surging of trade among IORA countries. Modern trade facilitation infrastructure and application of information technology could be the game changer in enabling higher trade among Asian and African economies. AAGC countries can cooperate in technology upgradation, particularly single windows, risk management and customs valuation. While India performs well in IT applications and services, Japan, on the other hand, has efficient risk management system in the world which would provide synergistic leadership by both countries in promoting cooperation among countries in Asia and Africa in trade facilitation under AAGC.

Trade facilitation refers to simplification, modernization and harmonization of export and import processes. 1 Gains from trade liberalization and integration depend on efficient trade facilitation in the form of robust infrastructure and simplification of customs, border and administrative procedures related to export and import of goods. Trade facilitation reduces transaction costs and eliminates time-consuming and cumbersome customs and documentation formalities required in cross-border trade of goods. Along with at-the-border infrastructure, trade facilitation in terms of computerization and automation, efficiency in customs clearance and risk management system helps address faster clearance of goods at the border thereby lowering trade costs and greater participation of developing and least developed countries in the global trade. With growing production fragmentation and increased trade in value-added products, goods cross border multiple times involving several countries. Thus, there is the likelihood of escalation in trade costs due to multiple crossing of goods. This can be addressed effectively if customs and border procedures are made business-friendly and adaptive.

The impact of trade facilitation is estimated to be significant for developing countries whether they export or import goods to or from rest of the world. In the context of the value-added trade, an increase of 0.1 in trade performance indicators for a country may result in value-added imports between 1.5 and 3.5 percent, and exports increase may range from 1 to 3 percent (Moïsé and Sorescu 2015) . Considering the importance of trade facilitation in enhancing global trade, WTO members concluded negotiations on the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) at the Bali Ministerial Conference in 2013. The Agreement came into force in February 2017 based on the Articles V, VIII and X of the GATT (WTO 2014) . A complete implementation of the TFA is estimated to reduce trade cost by 16.5 percent for low-income countries, 17.4 percent for lower middle-income countries, and 14.6 percent for upper middle-income countries, thus accelerating global growth while leading to significant welfare gains. 2 By offering special and differential treatment to developing and less developed countries, the TFA is expected to bring a drastic rise in the level and intensity of trade in the world. The Asia Africa Growth Corridor (AAGC) involves countries of Asia and Africa at varying levels of development and trade openness. This is reflected in their physical infrastructure, customs procedures, documentation and compliance formalities, publication, notification and inspections, and so on. Designed as a people-centric development strategy, the AAGC may stimulate economic activity in terms of higher private investment, greater participation of firms in value chains across different industries, skill upgradation and capacity building, and virtuous integration of growth poles and peripheries.

The Asia Africa Growth Corridor can be a great opportunity for the Indo-Pacific region as major global activities are centered in the region. Within the Indo-Pacific space, Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) is emerging as a dynamic region which needs to be properly nurtured. This region witnessed a sharp turnaround by registering an emphatic growth rate of 6.7 percent in 2010. Since 2016, growth rate of the region has been rising persistently and is expected to reach 5.3 percent in 2018. As the region has maintained a consistent growth performance, it enabled the region to maintain a higher share in the global real output. The share of the IORA region in the Gross World Product (GWP) has increased systematically even during the period of economic recession resulting from Subprime Mortgage Crisis in 2008-2009. The region shared almost one-tenth of world's real GDP in 2015. There has been a considerable divergence in growth and size of GDP in different sub-regions of the Indian Ocean Rim region. In terms of combined growth performance, South Asia has been performing better than East Africa, but there is evidence of convergence of growth performance in recent years among these sub-regions. Almost close to $7 trillion economy, the IORA is larger than the combined GDP of several Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs), including MERCOSUR, Pacific Alliance, Andean, SICA and CARICOM in terms of real GDP in 2015 ( (2017) Countries in the Indian Ocean Rim region are on the path of faster liberalization since the 1990s. Most of them are primarily trading nations with a strong dependence on the external sector manifested in high trade openness of more than 60 percent of GDP. The region was adversely affected by the second episode of the global recession. Several African states have embarked on trade liberalization, and countries like Mauritius and Seychelles have made significant headway in liberalizing their trade policies (Table 5 .1). Though country experiences differ significantly, there are instances of significant reduction in tariff rates in sectors like mining and manufacturing in most countries in IORA. Such liberalization of trade policy has been noticed in a number of countries, even during the period of recession.

The IORA region has registered high intra-regional trade (IRT) in the recent years. In terms of volume and ratio high IRT in IORA has marked a strong presence in the world economy. The region recorded an IRT flow of $1.23 billion and IRT ratio of 27.4 percent in 2014 (Table 5 .2). The region was greatly affected by the persistent global recession and the volume of the IRT declined steadily since 2012. There is a considerable difference in terms of IRT ratio between different sub-regions of the IORA; thus indicate larger trade possibilities among the member countries. Southeast Asia is emerging as the most dynamic sub-region in IORA, as the IRT ratio is the largest among other sub-regions. Interestingly, the IRT ratio of the East African subregion has almost doubled than that of the South Asian region, indicating vibrancy of the African counterpart in terms of regional economic integration in IORA. 

Countries in Asia and Africa along the AAGC are at varying levels of trade facilitation. Although no country is found extremely advanced in all dimensions of trade facilitation, countries in South Asia and Eastern Africa have made considerable progress on customs modernization and automation in recent years. In terms of efficiency of customs agencies, most of the sample South Asian and Eastern African countries are yet to achieve the desired level of efficiency. 3 While some are close to the global best practice score of 0.03 (measured in terms of expedited release procedures, the efficiency of customs and delivery of imports and exports) but many others, including Comoros, Tanzania and Myanmar, fall short of the global benchmark (Table 5 .3). Similarly, in automation and computerization processes, countries in Asia and Africa have done modestly well with the further scope of improvement. However, electronic processing and payment of duties and automated processing systems in Asia and Eastern Africa are relatively less advanced in comparison to the global best practices. It suggests the case for promoting mutual cooperation in some of the above mentioned areas of trade facilitation including risk management. As per the OECD trade facilitation indicators, Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa are below the best practice mark in terms of most of the trade facilitation measures (Fig. 5.2) . Achieving the desired level of trade facilitation is a challenging task for Africa and Asia because of a lack of technical know-how and skills. This can be verified from the notifications issued by some of the Asian and African countries under Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) of the WTO. The TFA gives flexibility to developing countries and LDCs to be identified under three categories A, B and C for implementation of the Agreement provisions. As per the TFA, measures notified under category C shall only be implemented by a country when it acquires requisite capacity through technical assistance and capacity building (WTO 2015) .

It has been observed that most of the African countries have been notified under category C, followed by Asia. More specifically, countries in Southern Africa and Eastern Africa need provisions of technical assistance and capacity building to implement TFA (Fig. 5 .3). For instance, Zambia notified 65 percent of measures under Category C, followed by Swaziland (49 percent), Nigeria (43 percent), Chad (36 percent) and Seychelles (32 percent). As per the WTO database, five measures most notified under category C by Sub-Saharan African countries are related to single window (Article 10.4), risk management (Article 7.4), average release times (Article 7.6), and enquiry points (Article 1.3) (Fig. 5.4) . Along with the improved soft infrastructure of trade facilitation, there is a need to develop transport infrastructure, particularly inland transport, as it is viewed as a prerequisite to enhance other capacities in terms of technology, risk management, and so on.

It is generally assumed that developed countries would be the providers of technical assistance and capacity building under the construct of North-South Cooperation. But it does not seem to be the case. Under Article 22 of the TFA, donor countries have to provide information to the WTO on the technical assistance and capacity building measures undertaken by them. However, as per the TFA database, Table 5 

Notified A Notified B Notified C Not yet notified Further, the TFA database shows that among the western countries only USA, Canada and EU have done allocations to the tune of $52 million towards trade facilitation in Africa. 4 Such commitments are inadequate given the length and breadth of Africa and the range of measures needed to be implemented within the ambit of TFA. Further, scarce resources for the implementation of the TFA may lead to the diversion of funds from developmental goals. In such a situation, there is scope for cooperation among the Asian and African countries, especially India and Japan, to support the improvement of trade facilitation in Africa. It has been found in a study by the UNECA (2013) that time taken for export and import activities is among the highest in Africa (excluding Northern region). Moreover, the documents required to export and import are also on the higher side in Africa (Table 5 .4). The Declaration of African Union Ministers of Trade has underscored the importance of trade facilitation and reiterated their priorities on enhancing infrastructure, boosting productive and trade capacities, reducing transaction costs, supporting reforms, and improvements in customs regulatory systems.

Countries in Asia and Africa have received aid from the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) for trade facilitation reforms. It would be interesting to assess trends of disbursements from the donors for trade facilitation in Africa; as the current trade policy reforms are focused on the trade facilitation and harmonization of regulations and standards. Total Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) from the DAC to Africa for trade facilitation has increased significantly since 2011. Among the major DAC donor nations, in 2015-16, the United States had the highest share (around 54 percent) to Africa, followed by the United Kingdom (26 percent). In absolute terms, the support by the United States to trade facilitation in Africa has increased since 2012 and has remained at around $56 million on an average over the period 2012-2015. In comparison, average disbursement from the United Kingdom Source World Bank (2012) over the same period was around $28 million. Among all developed countries, there has been a secular decline in the total share of DAC from 2012 onwards, after a steep rise in 2011 (Table 5 .5). The average share of total disbursements from all donors during 2012-2015 was $187 million. Among selected recipient countries of Africa, the total share of disbursements by the DAC countries was on an increasing trend over the period 2010-2013, followed by a decline in 2014, before registering a modest increase in 2015 (Table 5 .6). The total DAC disbursements to the selected nations of Africa for 2012-2015 were around $20 million on average with Tanzania receiving the highest, followed by South Africa and Kenya, respectively.

Besides tariff liberalization, trade facilitation reforms are viewed most important globally for trade policy reforms as well as for countries facing high trade costs. Rippel (2011) highlights the specific areas of reforms in trade facilitation and how it could be integrated with the development vision of African countries. The specific aspects of trade facilitation necessitating forward-looking policy reforms include the following: 

International trade, pertaining to customs administration, is becoming complex involving many agents within and across national borders. The complexities merit the development of IT systems. As the studies indicate that adoption of information technology can significantly reduce transaction time and costs which, in turn, would enhance the flow of international trade. 5 While mere adoption of IT for customs administration is not a sufficient condition, leveraging on it can yield far-reaching implications in terms of improved transparency, efficient information dissemination and advanced security (Chaturvedi 2009). A good number of countries in Asia and Africa have deployed IT systems to fasttrack the process of customs clearance. They have either adopted a relatively simple off -the-shelf automated customs data management system such as different versions of Automated Customs Data Management System (ASYCUDA) or have developed a more sophisticated sovereign platform e.g. Single Window, to suit respective national requirements. The key advantage of off -the-shelf solutions lies on the fact that various modules have already been tested, and are ready to be deployed which would reduce the opportunity cost of building it from scratch. However, a major limitation of these systems pertains to their limited possibility to customize to meet evolving national requirements. Nationalized solutions, such as single window, on the other hand, can be tailor-made to meet country-specific needs and would serve as a major advantage as the cost of compliance to multiple formalities is pretty high. 6 Evidences emerging from post-adoption of both of these platforms are mixed. 7 While ASYCUDA and Single Windows have largely yielded positive results, their performance has been modest in several situations for different reasons. 8 Many developing and least developing countries, which constitute a significant proportion in Asia and Africa, have not yet adopted IT for streamlining customs administration process.

ASYCUDA was the software launched by the United Nations for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in the early 1980s on the request of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). It gives automated assistance, covering most international trade procedures, ranging from trade facilitation, customs control, operational capacity along with allowing cost-effective replication and adaptation to higher upgraded versions. Ever since its initiation, many LDCs and developing countries have benefited from increased customs revenue due to reduced time in import and export and minimization of administration costs. However, in many cases, countries could not take full advantage of ASYCUDA due to varied reasons, such as electricity cuts and shortages impeding 24 × 7 operations, limited network connectivity, and deficient IT infrastructure in addition to inadequate training of customs staff to operate the systems (Godunov 2015) .

Single window, on the other hand, is broadly defined as a "platform that enables trade stakeholders to submit documents and other relevant information through a single point of entry in a standardized way to complete export, import and transit procedures" (CEFACT, 2005 in World Bank, 2007 . Thus, the information requirements of several regulatory authorities under different jurisdictions are submitted and processed at a single point. This, in turn, harmonizes regulatory compliance system resulting in faster trade flow. However, important challenges among others in the implementation of single window are in terms of high capital expenditure and recurring costs, lack of expertise among personnel to develop such systems in addition to the challenges witnessed in the case of ASYCUDA.

Countries of Asia and Africa have competitive advantage in IT sector which can be leveraged to fill gaps in trade facilitation of other countries. In particular, India has low cost and highly skilled English-speaking software professionals ensuring high quality of service delivery, meeting international standards. 9 In addition, frugal innovations and quick-fix solutions have been harnessed with limited resources resulting in good quality and affordable products adding to the comparative advantage of countries in the region. Both Africa and parts of Asia are privileged to have the young population. The entrepreneurial spirit among the young can be bolstered by furthering peopleto-people connect to create an ecosystem of innovation and smart solutions.

To enhance efficiency and to ensure widespread use of single window customs facilities in Asia and Africa, a number of problems are to be addressed. Funding is observed as a major problem for the successful implementation of the ASYCUDA. Government support for procuring bigger electricity generators in all ports and border points may help resolve issues of irregular power supply and erratic electricity cuts. Many a time, inadequate computer equipment and infrastructure affect use of ASYCUDA. Funds may be mobilized to purchase modern computer equipment and for installing proper network infrastructure at the ports. For instance, in Monrovia, a World Bank project is providing a comprehensive fibre optic network, including a data centre for greater Monrovia covering (at least 90 percent of the customs revenue collection). Customs clearance time is another area of crucial trade policy reform. The measures that would decrease clearance time may include the follow-up time with officers and the business community to ensure that the abandoned declarations are handled; additional training to reduce queries; additional system controls to enhance faster clearance, among others. Along with the above-mentioned measures, the efficiency of customs clearance rests on creating awareness of customs procedures and proper training of staff.

Effective customs valuation standards and practices improve trade facilitation and ensure authentic trade statistics. Harmonization of customs valuation procedures and practices at the international level ensures a level playing field for those engaged in international trade as well as transparency and predictability in international transactions. Absence of effective customs valuation practices and procedures acts as a trade barrier; reduces revenue realization by authorities as well as incentivizes money laundering due to under-invoicing and over-invoicing; increases corruption and dilutes outcome of a country's customs and trade policies.

Given the importance of customs valuation systems in overall trade outcome an Agreement on Customs Valuation (ACV) was concluded during the Tokyo Round of GATT negotiations in 1979. However, implementation of ACV at the national level requires the establishment of a legislative and regulatory framework; a mechanism for judicial review; administrative procedures; organizational structure; and training (De Wulf and Sokol 2005) . Implementation of the ACV across developing countries, particularly in Africa and Asia, has been sub-optimal. In general, there is a serious lack of adequate understanding of customs valuation procedures across the developing countries, which reduces the effectiveness of customs administration. Many of those lacunae include inaccurate or incomplete incorporation of the ACV provisions into domestic legislation; high average tariff rates leading to under-invoicing and most importantly administrative limitation. Lack of administrative capacity is particularly due to inadequate value data and poor means of information gathering; lack of qualified personnel; poor or non-existent training facilities; limited and often ill-managed computerization; unavailability of operating manuals; poor hierarchical supervision; and weak or non-existent internal audits. Improvement in valuation is directly related to the quality of customs administration; betterment needs customs modernization plan with a focus on better organization and management with administrative, financial and technical autonomy and accountability. Apart from overall customs administration, there is a need to strengthen institutions and infrastructure for valuation through a legislative framework, training of valuation officers, establishment of valuation offices, and value information systems and databases. Implementation of policies and procedures to ensure better customs valuation practices require firm action by the national governments as well as technical assistance from other countries, especially from developing country peers, who have evolved best practices in the customs valuation. For instance, India has established the directorate of valuation, special valuation branch and National Import Database to improve customs valuation practices. Similar institutions can be established in other developing countries through technical assistance.

Since the latter half of twentieth century, there has been a significant increase in trade volume which has increased demand for customs organizations to ensure regulatory compliance. At the same time, it is recognized that time-consuming customs procedures increase trade costs and act as non-tariff barriers. Hence, the objective of customs is to ensure regulatory controls as well as trade facilitation. In an effort to achieve a balance between trade facilitation and regulatory control, customs administrations are generally abandoning their traditional, routine "gateway" checks and are now applying principles of Risk Management (RM) with varying degrees of sophistication and success (De Wulf and Sokol 2005) . This approach has added advantages of increased efficiency of operations, streamlining of processes and procedures, and reduction in regulatory burden. The measure also allows for a better allocation of human resources, an increase in customs revenues, and improved compliance with laws and regulations (UNCTAD 2011).

In the current economic environment defined by globalization, significant growth in trade (to and from Africa, and also within Africa) and an exhilarating pace of change, implementation and designing of a customs risk management system is no longer a 'nice' to have but a stringent necessity (WCO Revised Kyoto Convention (RKC) Chap. 6). Objective of risk management within African states is for a balanced combination of not only trade facilitation and regulatory control but also revenue mobilization given social obligations. Across Africa, implementation of risk management processes in practice is met with varying success. The major constraints include lack of adequate human and technical capacity, inappropriate customs infrastructure including IT and telecom infrastructure, defective RM programme implementation, inadequate staff skills, lack of coordination among different arms of customs and lack of reliable and centralized data to facilitate risk management (Buyonge and Goodger 2014) .

Possible solutions to the above mentioned problems should encompass implementing capacity building programmes for field staff, establishing specific risk management units with the specific responsibility for maintenance and operation of the RM System, and use of automated systems for dynamic risk assessments. Further, there is a need to engage with technical assistance service providers with expertise and experience in implementing risk management solutions in developing countries. Additionally, there is a need to enforce a Unique Tax Identification Number (TIN) to check tactics used by importers of submitting different TIN to escape tax liability. In this context, there is a scope of drawing lessons from the unique identification system of India, called Aadhaar, which has benefits much beyond establishing unique TIN.

Another area of mutual learning is the Risk Management System (RMS) which has been implemented in all major customs ports/airports covering more than 90 percent of India's international trade. It has revolutionized the customs import clearance process by cutting down clearance times drastically. Instead of routine assessment and examination of all cargoes, only selected consignments should be taken up for scrutiny and examination. Implementation of the RMS has been a success story for Indian customs, and this initiative has been conferred with the Prime Minister's Award for Excellence in Public Administration.

India and Japan have made considerable progress on many fronts of trade facilitation in recent years (Figs. 5.5 and 5.6) . Both countries have undertaken many initiatives to improve customs procedures and for simplification of trading formalities and procedures. Lately, India has made significant strides in ease of doing business and business environment. This has been reflected in steady improvement in the rank of India in the World Bank Global Ranking of 'Ease of Doing Business'. As per the 2020 Report, India's rank is elevated to 63rd in 2019 among the 190 nations participated in the ranking; marking 14 places gain compared to the previous year. Indian customs have launched SWIFT facility to provide a single window interface for clearance of goods in the least possible time. The system has done away with the requirement of seeking approvals from multiple government agencies by integrating procedures in a single platform (CII 2017) .

Similarly, Indian customs have re-introduced Electronic Data Interchnage (EDI) Gateway called Indian Customs and Central Excise Electronic Commerce/EDI Gateway (ICEGATE), which was operational earlier, with enhanced integrated processes. In addition, an integrated RMS facility that has automated risk management systems has been launched. Under the new system, ICEGATE portal (and not the officers) would decide on the level of examination and testing based on the principle of risk management which would bring in efficiency and transparency. In another development, Project Saksham has been launched to integrate customs IT systems with Good and Services Tax Network (GSTN), thus extending a single window system and increasing 'ease of doing business' for those involved in the international trade.

As per the OECD trade facilitation indicators, Japan's Risk Management System (RMS) matches the global best practices score. Improvement noticed in risk assessment capabilities since 1999 has reduced operation costs as staffing levels remained unchanged, even though export and import transactions increased significantly. For effective risk management, Japanese Customs maintains import records and also relevant information on importers in an integrated and organized manner. Similarly, in the case of automation of customs procedures, Japan is at par with global best practices. It has one of the oldest automated customs clearance systems in the world that started working in 1978 with automation of customs procedures, electronic exchange of information and automation of other services including cargo storage and management. The system is called Nippon Automated Cargo Clearance System (NACCS), and it was developed under Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model. Such a rich experience under the PPP mode can be useful for African counterparts to achieve automation by leveraging local private sector.

Further, Japan has been offering technical assistance in RMS to developing countries through its own initiative, as well as through cooperation with the World Customs Organisation (WCO). There is a need to channelize such assistance under the aegis of the AAGC. India, moreover, has a relatively advanced system of customs clearance and border procedures than most of the African countries. Since improved trade facilitation is crucial for promoting cross-border trade, India and Japan can offer technical assistance and cooperation to other countries in Asia and Africa to strengthen linkages among different growth poles in the AAGC.

Following years of intense negotiations, the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) was adopted in the Bali WTO Ministerial, paving the way for bringing efficiency in customs clearance of goods at the border to bring down trade costs for developed and developing countries, participating in international trade. Developing countries are likely to be the key beneficiaries of this Agreement. For the rapid implementation of Trade Facilitation (TF) measures in Asia and Africa, the AAGC could be instrumental in initiating varieties of activities in areas such as private investment, inducing firms to participate in value chain activities, facilitating capacity building for skill development and integration of growth poles along the Afro-Asian stretch.

In the context of the Afro-Asian region, the recent global focus is on the Indo-Pacific region which has large opportunities for trade and investment. In the notional region of Indo-Pacific, Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) is an active regional economic forum with high growth dynamism during the period of global buoyancy and recession, and trade is increasingly becoming the driver of growth for the region. The growing importance of the regional trade has been the outcome of the fact that regional economies are active on their path of economic liberalisation, though countries differ significantly on average tariff rates within the region. Rapid trade liberalisation has triggered robust intra-regional trade (IRT) in IORA, as the ratio was reported at 27.4 percent in 2014, having huge trade potential to expand further following upturn in the global economy during the post-COVID-19 period. As the region is expanding in trade and has shown wide variations in TF infrastructure among regional economies, the AAGC can lend support to the region in its endeavour to modernise its customs and bringing in automation. Modernisation in the sector such as electronic processing and payments of duties as well as automated processing in the IORA and the Afro-Asian region would spur trans-continental trade to a large extent.

As such Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are below the global average in terms of undertaking TF measures, but the introduction of further initiatives under AAGC could benefit both the continents. For efficient implementation of TF measures, support like technical assistance and capacity building can be mustered through cooperation among Afro-Asian economies. In this regard, both India and Japan can extend support to their endeavour to implement TF measures. Reforms in TF are considered most pressing globally and Afro-Asian region is no exception to this trend. In this regard, reforms required in the region include the adoption of information technology to reduce transaction time to foster the flow of trade, particularly deployment of ASYCUDA; implementation of effective customs standards for ensuring level playing field for domestic players in international trade; adoption of better risk management measures for deploying human resources effectively, enhancing collection of customs revenue and compliance with domestic laws and regulations. India has an efficient track record of handling with the Risk Management System (RMS) by using several innovative instruments such as Tax Identification Number (TIN), Aadhaar, SWIFT, ICEGATE, GSTN, etc. to promote trade. On the other hand, Japan is a successful country in implementing TF measures and its RMS matches with the global best practices in TF. In this regard, India and Japan can support countries of the Afro-Asian region, particularly the Indo-Pacific including IORA in their endeavour to implement TF measures in the region.

See WTO Website on trade facilitation

Author estimation based on notifications under Article 22 (TFA database)

The Comoros, for example, introduced the ASYCUDA software in 2010 but it was not used widely by local traders. Electricity cuts and shortages made the system unreliable during regular business hours; the private sector did not experience the

University of Pennsylvania for causes and consequences of IT boom

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Customs data exchange: UNCTAD ASYCUDA experience

Contribution of trade facilitation measures to the operation of supply chains. OECD Trade Policy Papers No

Trade facilitation indicators

Why trade facilitation is important for Africa

Trade facilitation from Africa's perspective. United Nations Economic Commission of Africa

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The challenges of implementing the trade facilitation agreement