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This article examines the factors motivating customs reform in various countries. In particular, it describes how certain customs practices have recently evolved in response to the globalization of manufacturing, just-in-time production processes, and the growth in e-commerce. Countries have undertaken several types of customs reform, including the use of online single window systems to streamline customs paperwork and improve transparency; the adoption of “trusted trader” programs and risk assessment tools to speed customs clearance at border checkpoints; and efforts at harmonizing customs processing among regional trading partners. Guiding principles to improve customs efficiency were also agreed upon under the World Customs Organization’s Kyoto Convention and the World Trade Organization’s Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA). This article outlines these developments and reviews work by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Bank, and the World Economic Forum to benchmark countries’ progress in achieving customs reform, including implementing policy recommendations under the TFA.
Author(s)
The U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) marked its centennial anniversary in 2016. This article summarizes the proceedings of the conference that was organized to celebrate that occasion. Distinguished government officials, academics, litigators, and USITC alumni described how the need arose for the creation of such an agency, the problems experienced in launching it, and how it has fulfilled its mission. These discussions addressed both the high points and the trials and tribulations associated with a hundred years of increasingly complex challenges in collecting trade data, maintaining and reorganizing the tariff code, and conducting antidumping, countervailing-duty, safeguard, intellectual property, and fact-finding investigations. The conference presentations summarized here broadly reflect the structure and scholarship found in the forthcoming book, A Centennial History of the United States International Trade Commission.
Author(s)
During the early years of the period 2001–16, the majority of China’s medical device exports were low-technology goods. However, the composition of these exports has gradually shifted towards medium-and-high-tech devices. Since 2012, these goods have become China’s leading medical device export categories. This article discusses two factors behind this trend: (1) the country’s large and growing healthcare market, which has created opportunities for local producers to supply all segments within the sector, and (2) government policies that have prioritized the production of innovative medical devices from local companies.
Author(s)
Can changes in trade volumes explain improvements in the capacity of African states to collect revenue and to provide public services? Applying European trade literature, this paper analyzes whether Ghana’s state capacity is stronger than it would have otherwise been, due to its recent trade growth. This research represents a departure from most economics literature on trade, which typically focuses on improvements to economic performance. Instead, this paper addresses a frequently overlooked aspect of trade—its impact on a state’s political economy. Identifying the roots of stronger African state capacity is an important objective, in light of the concern expressed by Thies (2009) that African states, in their current form, may just limp along, hampered by their endowment of inhospitable geography. Improvements in a state’s capacity for governance mean it can better provide public goods, combat corruption, and attract private investment. The findings presented in this paper not only are consistent with the hypothesis that trade growth has had a measurable impact on Ghana’s state capacity, but—using a synthetic control—also demonstrate the rate of change. Although the weakness of African states has received much attention, the findings in this paper suggest that capacity levels can be directly bolstered through trade-promotion policies.
Author(s)
The proliferation of bilateral and plurilateral trade agreements has been discussed extensively in academic literature, where the primary focus has been on the economic impact of the resulting reduction of trade barriers. However, few resources offer an aggregated discussion of situations in which countries opt to suspend or end their participation in trade agreements, or are suspended from them. With the United Kingdom’s recent decision to leave the European Union, the withdrawal of countries from trade agreements has taken on increasing interest. To begin this discussion, this paper outlines over 150 instances of a country or group of countries leaving, being suspended from, or ending a trade agreement. Using data principally from the World Trade Organization and the Design of Trade Agreements Project, and ranging in time from 1950 (when China withdrew from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) to 2019, the authors have found 163 instances of suspension or cancellation of trade agreement participation. This paper explores two trends noted in these cases: (1) the high number of countries dropping participation in agreements in favor of pursuing “replacements”—deeper bilateral trading relationships, or trading relationships with more partners (82 percent of cases, confirming the literature that finds a global trend towards trade liberalization); and (2) the rise in the number of countries that have ended or suspended their participation in agreements without a subsequent replacement (about 18 percent of cases). Six case studies in this paper illustrate the geographic and situational diversity of countries’ suspension or withdrawal from trade agreements.
