Enhancing Public Availability of Customs Information
In the Islamic Countries
12
from trade facilitation in general,12 and there is suggestive evidence that they may face higher
trade costs, in part due to information and search costs, than larger firms.13
A secondary benefit is for governments: increased trade across borders tends to have a positive
effect on government revenue, given that governments collect taxes (tariffs) that are directly
related to the value of imports. Additional benefits include improvements in governance, as
public availability of information can help ensure that private parties are more aware of their
legal rights and responsibilities, which in turn can help reduce the incidence of governance-
related costs on the economy, in particular by making it harder for certain officials to require
unofficial payments concomitantly with transacting standard business.
1.1. Data Sources and Scope of Analysis
Since negotiations on theWTO TFA began, there has been renewed impetus among international
organizations to produce accurate measurements of the extent to which countries implement
the agreement’s provisions. These efforts also, in some cases, incorporate aspects of information
availability, as well as broader trade facilitation, that go beyond the TFA to include what could
be termed “TFA+” requirements, including paperless trade for example. The purpose of this
section is to review the major available sources in terms of their strengths, weaknesses, and
inter-relationships, and to identify the data sources to be used here.
The first major source is the OECD Trade Facilitation Indicators (TFIs). Developed while the TFA
was under negotiation, the TFIs are designed to capture the extent to which countries already
comply with the TFA’s core obligations, on a scale from zero (not implemented) to two (fully
implemented). Data are collected at a fine level, based on individual questions that closely relate
to the substance of the TFA’s provisions, and results on these provisions are available through
the OECD’s mapping tool. However, OECD only releases quantitative data at a more aggregate
level, corresponding to the main aggregates of TFA performance, namely:
 Information availability.
 Involvement of the trade community.
 Advance rulings.
 Appeal procedures.
 Fees and charges.
 Documents.
 Automation.
 Procedures.
 Internal border agency cooperation.
 External border agency cooperation.
 Governance and impartiality.
Of these, it is primarily the first four that are of interest for the present report. The OECD data
are used to show the component indicators that make up each aggregate. First, information
12 Hoekman, B., and B. Shepherd. 2015. “Who Benefits from Trade Facilitation Initiatives? Implications for
African Countries.” Journal of African Trade, 2(1-2): 51-70.
13 Lendle, A., M. Olarreaga, S. Schropp, and P.-L. Vezina. 2016. “There Goes Gravity: eBay and the Death of
Distance.” The Economic Journal, 126(591): 406-441.