On December 7, 2013 at the Bali Ministerial, the 159 WTO member countries approved the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA), the first new WTO multilateral agreement since the establishment of the WTO in 1995. After more than nine years of negotiations, WTO members finally reached consensus on a Trade Facilitation Agreement. The Trade Facilitation Agreement is a major accomplishment for the international trading community, a significant milestone for the WTO, and stands to regulate an area of trade that until now has been largely ignored. The Trade Facilitation Agreement has addressed developing country concerns in considerable detail, using novel measures to empower developing countries in their implementation of TFA measures. Turning to the text of the TFA, Section II of the two-part Agreement contains the special and differential treatment provisions. Over the various drafts, the TFA has evolved from only perfunctorily addressing the genuine concerns of developing country members to recognizing the need to provide structured and mandated support in relation to capacity building and implementation of trade facilitation rules by means of conditional obligations which will only become mandatory when or if certain conditions are met. Developed country members, acting as donors, agree to help developing and least developed country members by providing assistance and support for capacity building, including promotion of regional and sub-regional integration. With regards to least developed countries, targeted assistance and support is to be provided by the donors. In addition, many of the amended provisions involve lengthening the time available to developing and least developed member countries to implement various provisions relating to trade facilitation. The implementation of the TFA has the potential to increase global merchandise exports by up to $1 trillion a year, according to WTO’s flagship World Trade Report (WTR) released on October 26 in Geneva. The report said developing countries will benefit significantly from the TFA, capturing more than half of the available gains.
Bangladesh will soon ratify the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) of the World Trade Organisation as more than 50 nations have already approved the deal to simplify their trade rules. National Board of Revenue (NBR) has formed a 19 members committee under the chairmanship of Member (Customs) comprising officials/representatives of relevant ministries/ departments / trade bodies. In order to achieve the goal of TFA, the committee was given responsibility to lead the implementation of the TFA and also to undertake appropriate means to improve trading environment in Bangladesh. This committee is working as a forum for the concerned stakeholders to develop new ideas and to raise issues regarding trade facilitation.
Bangladesh has already undertaken step to reform the existing customs laws of the country to comply with WTO standard under TFA 2013. The draft of new Customs Act 2014 has been approved by the cabinet and will soon be placed in National Parliament for approval.
