Trade facilitation involves a wide and diverse range of public agencies with responsibility and oversight over the various procedures and formalities of cross-broder trade of goods. Public authority has largely been divested to specialised, quasi-autonomous executive agencies operating in often different locations; such as Customs departments, Health and Sanitary Bodies, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Transport etc..

In such an environment, institutional coordination and stakeholder consultation is essential for the planning and implementation of successful trade facilitation reforms. National coordination and consultation mechanisms with balanced participation of the relevant public agencies and private sector representatives have therefore been recommended as a means to provide this platform. Trade Facilitation bodies and so-called PRO committees were set up in many countries during the past 20 years, often in the realm of national and regional trade facilitation projects.

In the context of the WTO negotiations on trade facilitation in which WTO members engaged in since 2004, the importance of such national coordinating mechanism has come to the forefront of countries' preoccupations, once again; e.g. the submission of Honduras, Norway, and Switzerland in the WTO (TN/TF/W/158). Effective consultation with relevant stakeholders serves to ensure that Geneva-based negotiators have the best and most complete information and advice up which to participate in the negotiations. An effective channel of communication between capital-based experts and Geneva-based negotiators furthermore allows for an active participation in the discussions on the various proposals submitted to members in the Negotiating Group on Trade Facilitation (NGTF).

Achieving sustainability of the coordination mechanism is often a challenging task, in particular in view of sustainable funding, but also with regards to continous political support and private sector involvement. With this repository of country experiences UNCTAD and UNECE wish to contribute to the on-going process of setting up and maintaining an working group or national body on trade facilitation.

The repository offers case studies from countries that have set up an operational national coordinating mechanism on trade facilitation. It is planned to expand this repository over time to include further examples.

Further to the cases studies, background information can be found in:

The UN/CEFACT Recommendation No.4 (sd. edition) on National Trade Facilitation Bodies
and the related UN/CEFACT Guidelines to the Recommendation.

The UNCTAD Trade Facilitation Handbook Part I. National Trade Facilitation Bodies: Lessons Learned (Geneva 2005)

The UNCTAD Technical Note 18 "Multi-agency working group on Trade Facilitation"

Presentations of the UNCTAD/UNECE workshop on "Strengthening National and Regional Trade Facilitation Organizations" and the report of the meeting.

The World Bank "WTO Trade Facilitation Negotiations Support Guide", submitted at the WTO as TN/TF/W/51.

If you would like to provdide your administration's or country's experience to this repository please contact

Jan Hoffmann Chief Trade Facilitation Section UNCTAD Division of Technology and Logistisc Tel.: +41 229175291 Fax: +41 22 9170050 email: jan.hoffmann@unctad.org	Tom Butterly Team Leader Trade Facilitation UNECE Trade Development and Timber Division Tel.: +41 22 9171178 Fax: +41 22 9170629 tom.butterly@unece.org