Enhancing Public Availability of Customs Information
In the Islamic Countries
14
A second data initiative of interest, which also helps explain the scope and content of public
information availability, is the UN Global Survey (UNGS). The UNGS targets a wide range of
countries in all regions of the world, using a survey based methodology to elicit responses on
the availability of particular trade facilitation systems in each country, including in the area of
information availability. Concretely, the UNGS has four indicators that are of particular interest
here: existence of a National Trade Facilitation Committee (NTFC), publication of export/import
regulations online, stakeholders’ consultations on new draft regulations prior to finalization,
advance publication/notification of new regulations prior to implementation. Each indicator is
coded as either fully implemented (3), partially implemented (2), pilot stage (1), or not
implemented (0).
Of course, many other datasets also deal with trade facilitation. Examples include the World
Bank’s Doing Business and Logistics Performance Index datasets. However, the former does not
include any information at all on information availability. While the latter includes some data on
customs procedures in its “domestic” section, the detail of that information has been cut back in
recent editions, so comparisons year-on-year are difficult. The level of detail of the OECD and
UNGS data is far superior in this area, as it is what they are specifically designed to measure.
They therefore constitute the principle data sources for this report.
An additional data source for this report is an ad hoc survey of OIC member countries registered
to the COMCEC Trade Working Group. The survey covers the areas of specific interest for this
report. It was directed to delegates to the Group, as well as to other potential sources in member
countries where they could be identified. The survey was kept open from October 19th through
November 2nd , and was conducted online. Respondents were asked to give information on the
existence of particular dimensions of public information availability in their countries. Given
that the remit for the survey was only to address OICmember states, results cannot be compared
with other countries. Also, while the survey was answered in good faith and using the best
information available, it has not, for reasons of time and resources, been subject to the same
degree of cross-checking as the UNGS and TFIs. It is therefore suggested that the TFIs and the
UNGS should be the main data sources for this report, but that the COMCEC survey should be
used to provide additional, more detailed information where relevant. It is addressed
particularly in Section 3.
The data sources reviewed in this section are regarded as authoritative in the international trade
community. Their treatment of public information available closely mirrors the provisions of
the first four articles of the TFA, which represent the relevant legal benchmark for WTO
members. But they also go beyond those articles, to look at a broader information set, i.e. the full
set of regulations that affect trade, including procedures and forms. In addition, they also look
at the methods used to make certain information publicly available, and in particular the role of
information technology. Historically, public information availability relied on printing hard
copies of government registers, as well as legal documents. Now the cost of producing and
obtaining such information can be greatly reduced bymaking it available online. Many countries
indeed take this approach, and it is captured in the some of the data referred to in this section.
It is an issue that is returned to in the context of the case studies in Section 4.
In light of the breadth of the issues discussed above, many countries, supported by the World
Bank, have opted to adopt a comprehensive solution to information-related trade costs. That