The Trade Facilitation Agenda of the WTO and India’s Commitments: Where does India stand?

Authors

Surendar Singh
Utkarsh Kumar Mishra
Harleen Singh Sandha

Synopsis

With the ratification of the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) in 2016 under the aegis of the World Trade Organization, India has launched a comprehensive agenda for trade facilita­tion reforms to fulfil its legal commitments and improve its global ranking on ease of doing busi­ness indicators.

Implementation of the TFA hinges on various obligations in the form of these commitments under the agreement, which further depend on the ‘capacity’ of the member countries with regard to implementation. This capacity can be measured in terms of the ability of countries to effectively enforce these obligations by employing various stringent policies on the domestic platform, along with possible international initiatives. This discussion becomes interesting when we also scrutinise the legal nature of the provisions of the TFA.

Against this backdrop, this paper examines India’s commitments and capacity in light of various trade initiatives taken by the country, while at the same time looking into a myriad of challenges and possible opportunities that exist for India on its trade facilitation journey.

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Forthcoming

16 April 2018

Online ISSN

2413-3175