Enhancing Public Availability of Customs Information

In the Islamic Countries

There is no empirical evidence on the economic benefits of Mexico’s approach to information

availability, as well as online processing through the VUCEM Single Window. However,

intuitively the benefits are likely to take the forms discussed in general terms above. It is not

possible to present dollar figures for the benefits, as they have not been assessed in a rigorous

modeling framework.

Given the level of development of Mexico’s approach to information dissemination, as well as its

status as a middle income country, there is no evidence of a need for further technical assistance

to develop this area of trade facilitation. This view is reinforced by the country’s approach to

scheduling of its TFA obligations, where it has not placed any obligations in Category C (i.e.,

requiring further technical assistance prior to implementation becoming binding).

The key lessons fromMexico’s experience are:



Value chain trade, particularly in an integrated regional market, provides governments

with a strong incentive to improve trade facilitation, including by reducing

informational trade costs.



For strong performers, the TFA represents an agreed global benchmark, not a future

objective. As such, countries like Mexico can schedule the whole agreement in Category

A, as they are already compliant.



Although a virtual Single Window system is not necessarily required to increase public

availability of trade information, there are important synergies between the two

objectives, so pursuing them together can have tangible benefits for the trade

community.

4.2.

Singapore

Introduction

Singapore is a high income country according to the World Bank’s classification. As a small

country, it is highly trade dependent: the value of trade was equal to 322% of GDP in 2017.

Singapore has been used throughout this report as a proxy for the global best practice frontier.

Its high performance in logistics and trade facilitation is well known: it is frequently at or near

the top in relevant international rankings, like the World Bank’s Trading Across Borders

database, and the Logistics Performance Index. Singapore has consistently innovated in trade

facilitation, in particular through the use of ICT-based solutions.

Information Availability: General State of Play

Having already presented Singapore’s TFI and UNGS data as benchmarks on numerous other

occasions throughout this report, they are not repeated here. Instead, the analysis moves to a

consideration of the country’s performance on the detailed questions that form the basis of the

TFIs. As Table 6 (Annex 5) shows, Singapore scores the maximum possible score of 2 on nearly

every indicator in the four pillars covering information availability. There is room for

improvement in the timeliness of appeals, as well as the time given for consultations and

comments on draft measures (which must nonetheless be publicized prior to entry into force).

It is possible for a country’s trade to GDP ratio to be in excess of 100% because trade is measured on a gross

shipments basis, while GDP is measured on a value added basis. Accounting for re-exports also complicates the

calculation in Singapore’s case.