Philippines vows to make headway on trade facilitation

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippines targets to ratify soon the World Trade Organization’s Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) after the country failed to submit its instrument of acceptance last year.

Trade and Industry Secretary Adrian Cristobal said the Philippines’ ratification of the TFA is now in its final review and the country would soon submit its instrument of acceptance to the WTO Secretariat.

“We are just lacking approval from a couple more agencies. I’m not sure which agencies but we’re confident that the TFA will be ratified. It will be very good for our small and medium enterprises,” Cristobal said.

The TFA, which was concluded at the WTO’s 2013 Bali Ministerial Conference, contains provisions for expediting the movement, release and clearance of goods, including goods in transit.

It also sets out measures for effective cooperation between customs and other appropriate authorities on trade facilitation and customs compliance issues, the WTO said.

However, the TFA will only enter into force after two-thirds of the WTO membership has formally accepted the agreement.

Seychelles was the latest member to ratify the TFA after submitting its instrument of acceptance to the WTO Secretariat last Jan. 11. It became the 66th WTO member to do so.

Other WTO members which have accepted the TFA include Hong Kong, Singapore, United States, Mauritius, Malaysia, Japan, Australia, Botswana, Trinidad and Tobago, the Republic of Korea, Nicaragua, Niger, Belize, Switzerland, Chinese Taipei, China, Liechtenstein, Lao PDR, New Zealand, Togo, Thailand, the European Union (on behalf of its 28 member states), the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Pakistan, Panama, Guyana, Côte d’Ivoire, Grenada, Saint Lucia, Kenya, Myanmar, Norway, Viet Nam, Brunei, Ukraine, Zambia, Lesotho and Georgia.

“Basically there are developed countries that provide subsidies for products that they export abroad to other markets. Now it becomes a disadvantage to developing countries who also export to the same market because they’re not as competitive now as those subsidized. So one of the agreements there is to eliminate those exports subsidies. In that scenario, at least you’ll have a level playing field for those who export,” Cristobal said.

“Once those subsidies are removed, then our agricultural exports have better chances against competing products from other countries,” he added.

According to the WTO’s World Trade Report, implementation of the TFA has the potential to increase global merchandise exports by up to $1 trillion per year.

In addition, the report said developing countries would stand to benefit significantly from the TFA by capturing more than half of the available gains.