Enhancing Public Availability of Customs Information
In the Islamic Countries
56
recognition of the important role trade can play in promoting income growth and development
over the medium-term.
Key lessons from Singapore’s experience include the following:
 A commitment to public availability of trade-related information is on-going, not once
off. Systems need to be constantly upgraded and improved.
 Next generation trade facilitation solution leverage not only ICTs, but also open-
architecture development platforms so that solutions to problems can come from value
added services designed by the trade community itself.
 The TFA, although a useful global benchmark, represents the level of performance
achieved by global leaders some time ago. As such, all countries, even world leaders,
need to constantly innovate in trade facilitation, including through new measures to
reduce the informational costs associated with trade transactions.
4.3. United Arab Emirates
Introduction
The UAE is a high income country according to the World Bank classification. In 2017, its trade
to GDP ratio was 173%, which indicates a very high level of engagement with the world
economy. The country has been working hard at all levels to become a transport and logistics
hub, and this has included considerable investment in improving its trade facilitation
performance.
Information Availability: General State of Play
Figure 30 indeed shows that the UAE is a strong performer relative to the global best practice
frontier, proxied by Singapore. Its scores are close to Singapore’s in relation to information
availability, involvement of the trade community, and appeal procedures. Only in the area of
advance rulings does it have a significantly lower score.
Figure 30: TFI scores for the UAE, with Singapore as a reference, 2017.
Source: OECD TFIs.
0,000
0,500
1,000
1,500
2,000
Information
Availability
Involvement of the
Trade Community
Advance Rulings
Appeal Procedures
UAE
Singapore