Improving the Border Agency Cooperation
Among the OIC Member States for Facilitating Trade
58
ambitious goals. ASEAN has already geared efforts towards the harmonisation of standards,
and transparency, amongst other things. In the framework of the ASEAN Free Trade
Agreement (AFTA), there is focus on customs modernisation and standards, as well as
technical regulations. Other trade facilitation measures include the establishment of the
ASEAN Customs Agreement, the ASEAN Framework Agreement on the Facilitation of Goods in
Transit, the ASEAN Framework Agreement on Multimodal Transport, the implementation of
the ASEAN Framework Agreement on Mutual Recognition Arrangements, and the ASEAN
Single Window Agreement.8384
Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation
An important initiative within the Asian region is the Central Asia Regional Economic
Cooperation (CAREC) Program. It is an initiative of 10 countries and 6 partners, which
promotes regional cooperation in the fields of trade facilitation, transport, trade policy and
energy. There are eight OIC members, namely Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz
Republic, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The non-OIC partners are China
and Mongolia. As of 2015, 166 CAREC-related projects worth around 27.7 BUSD have been
implemented in the four core areas of cooperation: transport, trade facilitation, trade policy,
and energy.
In trade and transport, the first priority is to improve infrastructure by construction of roads,
railways, transport corridors, multimodal hubs, and border crossings, for seamless regional
trade and logistics. Another focus area is the modernisation of customs, sanitary and plant
health (phytosanitary) controls mainly through further BAC and integration of national single
window systems. The third focal area is the better management of the transport and border
crossing infrastructure.
Trade facilitation is one of the fundamental objectives of CAREC. In this context, there is a
strong focus on faster and more efficient movement of goods across borders. In order to
achieve this goal, CAREC has undertaken a number of major initiatives such as putting in place
simplified regulations and automated procedures for harmonising customs procedures;
adopting standard international custom codes; improving infrastructure at border crossing
points; and introducing effective risk-management systems to shorten customs procedures. In
order to facilitate customs cooperation, CAREC has also set up a Customs Cooperation
Committee that meets on a regular basis. The priority areas are joint customs control, customs
modernisation, improved data exchange, faster clearance times, simplification and
harmonisation of customs procedures, regional transit development and risk management
strategy.85
Research suggests that border crossings slow down regional trade in the CAREC countries and
undermine efficiency of cross-border logistics. Based on more detailed time release studies,
WCO recommended the CAREC countries to set up joint customs controls to synchronise
inspections at borders for faster border crossing. So far, new joint customs control
arrangements have been piloted at border crossings between China, Kazakhstan and Mongolia,
along two trade lanes. The pilots follow a three-phased approach: 1) document harmonisation
83 UNCTAD, 2011
84 We will discuss ASEAN and its effects on BAC more profoundly in Case Malaysia in Chapter 4 of this report.
8 (accessed 1 June 2016)