Trade Facilitation: The Road Ahead

This paper analyses the state of negotiations on trade facilitation within the WTO system. It discusses the interests of the global business community in trade facilitation, the progress on this issue within the WTO, addresses the concerns of parties which are resisting the inclusion of trade facilitation in future negotiations and highlights the gains arising from the implementation of measures designed to promote trade facilitation. The paper concludes with an approach which could yield results in Cancun, even if other new issues on the WTO agenda are not ripe for negotiations, and a follow-up for post-Cancun negotiations to develop a framework of WTO commitments to encompass key trade facilitation principles.