WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  RESTRICTED 
TN/TF/M/33 
26 April 2010 
 (10-2169) 
Negotiating Group on Trade Facilitation  
  
 
MINUTES OF THE MEETING 
 
Held in the Centre William Rappard 
from 8 – 12 February 2010  
 
Chairman:  H.E. Mr. Eduardo Ernesto Sperisen-Yurt (Guatemala) 
 
 1. The Chairman recalled that the proposed age nda for the session had been circulated in 
WTO/AIR/3497.  The aim of the meeting was to embark on a first read through the new Draft 
Consolidated Negotiating Text, circulated as TN/TF/W/165.   
2. The agenda was adopted. 
3. The Chairman shared his ideas on how he wished  to organize the negotiating week.  Based on 
Members' discussions at the planning meeting of 20 January, the goal was to initiate a first read 
through the Draft Consolidated Negotiating Text in order to allow dele gations to familiarize 
themselves with its contents and to see if certain br ackets could be removed.  Members could agree to 
either accept the language in the brackets or delete it.  In some cases, language in brackets could be 
streamlined and combined.  
4. Having reviewed the text, he had determined that there were two categories of brackets.  First, 
the relatively "easy" ones, which consisted of repe titive text or stylistic/linguistic differences.  
Examples included words or phrases that were almost  identical and had the same meaning or that 
were simply repeated in a slightly modified form.  
5. The second category consisted of the more difficu lt brackets.  Those were the brackets that 
contained text that would affect the level of commit ment or the scope of the text.  They could also 
relate to measures that there bracketed in their entirety.  
6. In order to review as many parts of the text as possible, it was necessary to stick to the easy 
brackets and to avoid discussion of the elements that  would change the level of commitment or scope. 
If anyone wanted a particular language to remain as it was, it would stay as currently reflected and 
Members would be invited to move on. 
A. WORK ON THE  DRAFT CONSOLIDATED NEGOTIATING TEXT  
7. This part of the meeting was conducted in info rmal mode with the exception of the following 
presentations of new formal submissions: 
8. The representative of the United States intr oduced proposal TN/TF/W/169 on penalty 
disciplines. Since the last meeting of the NGTF, th e United States had undertaken an extensive review 
of the Draft Consolidated Negotiating Text.  One no table omission in this text was the important area 
of penalties.  The US had sought to rectify that with its submission.  TN/TF/M/33 
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  9. The importance of clarity and the need to ensure  predictability in the application of penalties 
was demonstrated by the fact that the Revised Ky oto Convention had an exte nsive Annex, Annex H, 
dedicated to penalties and the treatment of customs of fences.  There were 27 provisions in that Annex. 
Penalties had been touched upon as an area for furthe r clarification and improvement in the earlier 
papers submitted to the NGTF, particular ly in the context of publication.  
10. The substantive provision on penalties in the GATT 1947 was found in Article VIII:3.  
It provided the fundamental disciplines on penalti es for minor breaches of customs regulations and 
requirements, demonstrating concern that the poten tially punitive operation of penalty regimes dated 
back to 1947. 
11. While the disciplines on minor breaches were an important part of a penalty regime, there 
were additional aspects of the application of pena lties that could benefit from clarification and 
improvement.  
12. The US had received troubling reports from traders about the lack of transparency, 
predictability and impartiality of some customs penalty regimes.  The complaints ranged from 
excessive penalties for minor clerical errors to a llegations of customs officials personally profiting 
from the amounts collected through the asse ssment of penalties and increased duties.  
13. In addition, while all customs services would like to see 100 per cent compliance with the 
governing laws and regulati ons and most traders did their best to comply, the reality was that some 
traders could and did submit inaccurate informati on and that penalties were a necessary element of 
a well-functioning customs regime.  
14. Clear, transparent and predictable penalty regi mes helped to address all of these situations. 
They provided certainty for all participants in the trading system.  Such regimes offered incentives for 
traders to provide customs services with accurate info rmation at the outset and to correct mistakes as 
quickly as possible once they were discovered.  Th ey also made sure that customs operated with 
integrity and efficiency without creating incentives  to make determinations that led to further 
litigation. 
15. It was in that context that the United States in troduced their draft text on penalties.  It was 
hoped to provide important specificity on the issue.  Paragraph 1 stated that penalties should be based 
on the level of culpability of the legally respons ible party who committed the breach. GATT Article 
VIII already made reference to levels of culpabilit y such as fraudulent intent.  Paragraph 1 of the US 
proposal was designed to provide further specifici ty on how culpability should be factored into 
an effective penalty regime. 
16. Paragraph 2 reiterated the commitment already found in GATT Article VIII that penalties for 
minor breaches, other than clerical errors, should not be greater than to serve merely as a warning to 
avoid future breaches. 
17. Paragraph 3 covered clerical errors . It provided that such clerical  errors (as defined further in 
paragraph 10 as a mistake in copying, inputting or transmitting information) s hould not be subject to 
penalties.  This paragraph proposed further specifici ty on the treatment of minor breaches by defining 
clerical errors and providing that clerical errors could be corrected and not be subject to penalties. 
That was ever more important in today's electronic environment. 
18. Paragraph 4 was designed to ensure the integrity  of penalty regimes as well to provide for 
impartiality.  The proposed text specifically addr essed conflicts of interest by ensuring that 
government officials did not personally benefit fr om or received a portion of any penalties or 
additional duties assessed and collected.   TN/TF/M/33 
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19. Paragraph 5 dealt with due process in penalty procedures.  It ensured that the legally 
responsible party upon whom a penalty was asses sed received a written explanation specifying 
the nature of the breach, the goods involved and how the penalty was determined. Such written 
notification was fundamental to mainta ining a transparent penalty regime.  
20. Paragraph 6 aimed to encourage traders who discovered that they had made a mistake to come 
forward to customs and voluntarily disclose the breach. In return for the disclosure, the trader would 
receive a reduced penalty.  That important in centive promoted more accurate duty collection and 
reduced the administrative cost of  ensuring accurate assessment.   
21. Paragraph 7 set forth the commitment to give trad ers the right to appeal penalties.  That right 
was already contemplated by Article X of the GATT. 
22. Paragraph 8 provided that a Member must specify  a finite period of time in which it had to 
initiate penalty proceedings.  That kind of provision was a common feature of many legal systems, generally referred to as establishing a statute of limitations or period of prescription, establishing 
a period within which penalty proceedings must be initiated, assist customs in allocating resources as 
well as in setting rules for other customs disciplines su ch as record keeping.  That principle was also 
contained in paragraph 4 of Annex H of the Revised Kyoto Convention.  
23. Paragraphs 9, 10 and 11 provi ded definitions for the terms "legally responsible party", 
"clerical error" and "minor breaches".  
24. The US looked forward to working with Member s on the proposed draft text and was pleased 
to answer questions at the current meeting and in the weeks ahead.  
25. The representative of the United States introduced document TN/TF/W/166.  He drew 
attention to a typo that had been corrected in a corri gendum.  In paragraph 2.2(c), the word "If" had to 
be included at the beginning of the sentence.   
26. It was worth recalling that what Members were  implementing with those S&D provisions was 
a set of commitments they all wanted to implemen t.  The heart of the proposal reflected Members' 
common interest in an approach to S&D a nd TACB that took into account the individual 
circumstances of each developing and least-develope d country Member.  As they had all come to 
agree over the last few years, each such Member  would submit its own schedule for implementation 
on a provision-by-provision basis.  As accustomed as  they had become to this common expectation, 
this approach was unprecedented in the WTO, and represented a creative development they could all 
take pride in. 
27. Also novel was the approach of scheduling so -called category B and C commitments after 
entry into force of the Agreement.  But delegations ha d come to agree together that this made sense in 
order to provide time for Members to properly anal yze the provisions and to consult with donors.  
Under the US proposal, there would be at least tw o years between signature of the Trade Facilitation 
(TF) Agreement and the point at which schedules would be finalized. 
28. The challenge faced was how to structure S&D treatment to provide that flexibility while 
retaining the benefits of a WTO Agreement.  The outcome needed to provide security and 
predictability for traders and other Members, wh ich meant that incentives must be included for 
compliance with provisions that all Members had ag reed to wanting to implement, and guidance to 
donors on their collective priorities, to ensure th at assistance would support their common goal of 
raising up the international trading system.  Th e US hoped that their proposal accomplished that. TN/TF/M/33 
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  29. They had tried to take a simple approach.  For that reason, categories of commitments were 
described in the body of the docum ent according to their function in the process, rather than in a 
separate definitions section.   
30. The proposal also did not include provisions  on submission of Category A provisions, 
because those would already have been submitted be fore these provisions went into effect.  Each 
Member's list should, in general, be submitted by  the time of signature, in order to encourage 
Members to present a robust packag e for Ministers to sign.  The US delegation was, however, aware 
of concerns that some LDCs might need more ti me to prepare Schedule A and was therefore open to 
flexibility.  But the incentives for LDCs should not be reduced when their Ministers were present to 
sign.  
31. In Article 2.2, the proposal set forth a tw o-step process for each Member to establish its 
timeframes.  The first step involved submission of indicative/draft time frames for both B and C 
commitments.  In the course of preparing indica tive timeframes, the Member was able to mobilize 
relevant agencies and ministries to coordinate thei r planning in advance of the time to submit final 
timeframes.  The indicative time frames also helped donors understand the Member's priorities, and 
helped them provide input to the Member's plans.  And they helped other Members to get a sense of 
the time that their neighbours considered necessary before taking the second step, submitting final 
timeframes to the Trade Facilitation Committee. 
32. In the US draft, the process for both Category B and C provisions took place at the same time.  
That allowed Members to shift provisions between Categories B and C as necessary between the time they submitted the draft indicative time frames and the time they submitted the final time frames, 
without the need to create any new notifications or elaborate procedures. 
33. The US draft proposal also provided that the TF Agreement needed to set out specific dates 
for submission of draft, and then final, Schedules B/C.  That was very important for successful implementation of the Agreement.  These procedural  deadlines for submission of individual schedules 
would help governments mobilize to prepare the schedules, help mobilize donors to act, and would 
provide transparency and predictability to  trading partners and investors.   
34. At the same time, Article 2(e) recognized that if a Member had difficulties finding a donor, it 
should be able to come to the TF Committee (TFC) fo r assistance and, if necessary, an extension.  
The draft recognized the need to be ready for this  worst case scenario, but it did not assume the worst 
would  occur in every instance.  By providing for pr oblems to be raised with the Committee, the draft 
contemplated that, in addition to providing ad ditional time, Members could help resolve these 
problems. 
35. Article 3 set out the provisions for the Earl y Warning Mechanism in which a Member could 
request an extension for difficulties in implem entation.  The TFC was to give sympathetic 
consideration to such requests.  Consideration by the Committee would enable Members not only to 
provide additional time, but also to help resolve the actual problems confronting the Member in its 
efforts to implement.  
36. Article 4 set forth various proposed activities of the TF Committee, including serving as 
a forum for discussions and experience-sharing on TACB and implementation.  It would also be 
a recipient of contact information and information on assistance being provided. 
37. Article 5.1 set out an idea the US had proposed over two years ago: a dispute settlement grace 
period of two years for any provisions a Member notified under Category A, that was, to implement 
as of the date of entry into force.  As Members had noted at the time, the US believed that this grace 
period could serve as an additional incentive to Me mbers to include provisions in Category A, and  TN/TF/M/33 
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contribute to an early, robust pack age for Ministers.  It also provided that, while dispute settlement 
provisions would not apply, Members should neverthe less be willing to consult with each other.   
38. Article 5 also provided for particular consider ation of the situation of LDC Members in all 
dispute settlement matters.  Finally, in a separat e provision, Article 5.3 provided that the Committee 
was to encourage and facilitate non-dispute settleme nt consultations and ne gotiations in order to 
achieve mutually satisfactory solutions.  The US  believed that was consis tent with the general 
cooperative spirit of these negotiations, which woul d hopefully continue once the TF Agreement was 
in force. 
39. Article 6.1 set out the agreement of Members to facilitate the provision of TACB on mutually 
agreed terms, while Article 6.2 provided a set of principles for providing technical assistance that 
Members should endeavor to apply.  The proposal tr ied to put forward ideas that could help promote 
the coordination and coherence Members a ll felt was important in that area.   
40. Those S&D provisions were intended to assist in implementing a set of commitments that 
Members agreed to facilitate trade, commitments they  wanted to implement and that they wanted their 
neighbours to implement.  The US understood that not every proposal on the table would fall into that 
category.  But having agreed on a set of provisions, delegations must all have confidence that their 
traders would definitely receive the benefits of the Agreement.  
41. The US looked forward to continuing the discussions on that vital issue. 
42. Upon resumption of the meeting in formal m ode, the representative of UNCTAD reported on 
UNCTAD's activities to support developing countri es and LDCs during the negotiations on trade 
facilitation at the WTO. 
43. In the current phase of the negotiations, UNC TAD's activities focused above all on capacity-
building and advisory services.  While at the beginning of the negotiations UNCTAD had mainly 
organized and contributed to awareness raising an d training seminars, they had moved towards more 
tailor-made national and regional cooperation, wh ile also continuing the development and updating 
of technical material.  
44. UNCTAD wished to update Members on six specific areas of their activities. 
45. The first consisted of supporting national co llaborative mechanisms/task forces.  UNCTAD 
believed that it was very important that, at the na tional level, countries could count on a functioning 
mechanism to prepare, undertak e and continuously update the national assessments of trade 
facilitation needs and priorities.  Those mechanis ms might be called, for example, collaborative 
platforms, task forces, inter-institutional worki ng groups or trade facilitation committees.  They 
involved all key stakeholders from the public and priv ate sector who had a role to play in the national 
trade facilitation agenda.  The same collaborative mechanisms were also required when implementing 
trade facilitation reforms.  
46. UNCTAD and the ECE had together created a we b-based repository of such trade facilitation 
working groups, where so far 13 countries shared  information about the structure and scope 
of activities of their national task forces.1  This information helped the Annex D Organizations to 
understand the challenges such task forces faced and provided further tailor-made support to 
strengthen their capacity.  
                                                      
1 http://r0.unctad.org/ttl/repository/TFWGintro.htm TN/TF/M/33 
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  47. A communication by Saint Lucia from March 2009, JOB(09)/11, included a "checklist of 
indicative actions for the establishment and sustaina bility of a multi-agency working group on trade 
facilitation" and benefited from a technical note prepared by UNCTAD. 
48. UNCTAD's continued support to national workin g groups through flexible tailored activities 
contributed in several countries to maintaining these collaborative national trade facilitation platforms 
beyond the national WTO trade facilitation needs assessments.  The activities strengthened the 
capacity of the working groups to play an active role in the negotiating process.  As the national 
working groups were expected to play an important role in the future of the implementation of trade 
facilitation reforms, UNCTAD shared lessons l earned from supporting these working groups with 
other development partners.  The Secretariats of re gional organizations were an effective multiplier of 
UNCTAD's support in that context.   
49. The second type of activity consis ted of collaboration with regiona l organizations.  It aimed at 
achieving synergies between the regional and multilate ral trade facilitation agendas.  In particular, 
UNCTAD had developed a close partnership with the Secretariats of the OECS (the Organization of 
Eastern Caribbean States) and UEMOA (Union Ec onomique et Monétaire Ouest Africaine), and 
initiated a similar cooperation with the M CCA (Mercado Común Centroamericano).  
50. In the Caribbean and West Africa, UNCTAD had provided advisory services and expertise to 
the secretariats and its member stat es with regards to the trade facilitation negotiations at the WTO.  
This support by UNCTAD had strengthened the regional secretariats' coordinating role and 
underpinned the importance of regional trade f acilitation reforms as components of regional 
integration processes. Working through the regiona l level allowed national governments to better link 
the multilateral negotiations with other ongoing nego tiations at the regional or bilateral level.  
51. Both, at the national and at the regional leve l, the private sector was a key stakeholder who 
needed to be actively involved in the national or  regional task forces.  Against this background, 
UNCTAD had engaged in a third kind of activities, consisting of providing a forum for the private 
sector from developing countries. 
52. On Monday and Tuesday of the following week , UNCTAD, in collaboration with the WTO, 
and supported by the EU, Sweden and Switzerland,  was organizing the first Forum on WTO, Trade 
Facilitation and the Private Sector in Developing Countries titled "Engaging the Trading Community".   
53. The trading community was vital for any country's  trade facilitation agenda.  First, it was the 
traders and the service providers who needed to identify their needs and priorities regarding the 
trading environment and the potential implications of commitments resulting from a multilateral 
agreement.  Secondly, for numerous specific meas ures, the private sector might also actively 
participate in their implementation.  There were al ready more than 100 registered participants while 
the room could only hold 110 – which was why delega tes were encouraged to arrive early next 
Monday morning at the Centre William Rappard.  The meeting started at 10 a.m.  Brochures were 
available at the back of the room.  
54. UNCTAD did not only provide a forum for the priv ate sector, but also for Members' delegates 
in Geneva.  The fourth type of  activities consisted of round ta bles and support to Geneva-based 
delegations. 
55. An important area of concern for the NGTF a nd especially the delegations from developing 
countries and LDCs had been the issue of Speci al and Differential Treatment, combined with 
requirements for technical assistance and capacity building.   TN/TF/M/33 
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56. UNCTAD had prepared a comparative study on SDT in selected WTO instruments and 
possible lessons that could be drawn for a future Trade Facilitation Agreement.  While working on the 
study, they had benefited from insights from dele gations who had participated in two related 
brainstorming sessions in Geneva.  In one of the sessions, preliminary results of the study had been 
presented and discussed among delegates.  The firs t draft had been very much appreciated and 
received both valuable comments and good reviews from delegations from deve loping and developed 
countries, which helped UNCTAD to now finali ze the study. UNCTAD was planning further events 
in Geneva to provide a forum for delegates to di scuss technical issues outside the negotiating room.  
57. The fifth area of UNCTAD's contribution to  a better understanding of the issues discussed 
during the negotiations consisted of technical notes on trade facilitation. UNCTAD had produced and 
published on-line about 20 technical notes on specific trade facilitation measures.  Usually between 4 
and 8 pages long, those short documents aimed at providing a brief introduction to the measures, put 
them into the context of the WTO negotiations, and provided some sources for further reading.2 
A printed and edited version of the main technical  notes would soon be made available in English, 
French and Spanish.  
58. Beyond those technical notes, which had been written specifically in the context of the WTO 
negotiations, UNCTAD was active in a wide range of trade and transport facilitation programmes. 
They included the ASYCUDA programme, national trade facilitation projects, support for the Almaty Programme of Action and research and publications such as the Review of Maritime Transport and 
the Transport Newsletter.  
59. UNCTAD also organized experts meetings on i ssues such as public private partnerships and 
on transit ports.  It was that broad range of UNC TAD's trade and transport facilitation activities that 
provided the technical basis for the substantive contributions that UNCTAD made to the NGTF.  
60. The last type of contribution consisted of support for the national self assessments and the 
collaboration with the WTO a nd other Annex D partners.  
61. During the last 3 years, UNCTAD had provided facilitators for 17 national self assessment 
workshops.  UNCTAD considered the national sel f assessment workshops to be an important 
contribution to the process of analysing technical  assistance needs, and they were proud to be 
associated with the WTO technical assistance pr ogramme.  At the same time, UNCTAD had also 
complemented this programme through the range of activities mentioned above.  
62. Those complementary activities were very much  linked. National and regional collaborative 
platforms needed to communicate with each other;  The private sector was consulted through these 
collaborative platforms, but also in Geneva, the resu lts of the technical work were transmitted to the 
counterparts in Geneva and in the capitals. 
63. All in all, UNCTAD was of the view that the collaboration with delega tes in Geneva, with 
counterparts in the capitals and with the partners  in the WTO and the other Annex D organizations 
had been very fruitful.  During the last years, th at collaboration had already helped to advance the 
trade facilitation agenda of developing countries and LDCs, and UNCTAD would continue its efforts 
to advance the reform processes.  
64. UNCTAD wished to express their gratitude to the governments of Sweden, Spain, 
Switzerland and Norway who were financially  supporting the UNCTAD Trust Fund and thus 
complemented UNCTAD's regular budget resources assigned to these activities. Other donors were of 
course welcome to contribute to what had been so far a very successful and constructive partnership 
with WTO Member States.  
                                                      
2 http://r0.unctad.org/ttl/technical-notes.htm TN/TF/M/33 
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  65. The representative of the World Customs Or ganization (WCO) commented on the WCO's  
principal mission.  On the one hand, it consisted of the preparation and implementation of rules and 
international standards with a view to simplifyi ng and harmonizing procedures and custom regimes at 
the international level.  On the other hand, th e WCO was very much engaged in strengthening 
international customs cooperation. 
66. It was essential to ensure th at these instruments of international customs cooperation were 
well applied and adequately implem ented.  Within that context, the WCO continued to respond 
positively to requests for assistance from Memb ers in their modernization efforts.  
67. The WCO also continued to work on strengthe ning cooperation with donor organizations so 
that they could contribute to customs reforms acco rding to the norms and best practices of the WCO, 
especially those of customs in the 21st century.  
68. In this context, WCO Members benefited from te chnical assistance by the WCO regarding the 
planning of their activities and the search for fi nancial support in order to implement their 
modernization programmes.  This often meant organizing meetings between Members and donors. 
69. Recently, the WCO had seen that continued assistance was necessary for certain Members to 
assist them in developing and managing their modernization plans.  To ensure that they obtained 
sustainable results, it was indispensable to precisel y define the priorities and to match them with 
external support and with national initiatives.  In this  regard, support for strategic planning  was a very 
important type of assistance provided by the WC O and corresponded well to the future needs arising 
from the current negotiations.   
70. The WCO also had at its disposal a large number of instruments, tools and mechanisms to 
strengthen capacity, particularly fo r middle-range and senior officials, especially with respect to the 
planning and management of projects and of any change. 
71. The representative of the OECD reported on the OECD's recent activities in the area of Trade 
Facilitation.  In addition to the OECD's involveme nt in the WTO's needs assessment programme and 
their involvement in managing the WTO-OECD data base on technical assistance, the OECD had been 
busy over the past months with the development of Trade Facilitation indicators.   
72. Contrary to the indicators that already existe d, the OECD ones were not meant to be an 
overall welfare impact measurement of Trade Facilita tion.  They were also not designed to compare 
countries to see which performed better than the othe r in the area of TF.  Rather, the focus was on the 
impact of specific TF measures on trade costs.  They looked at which trade facilitation measures, amongst the ones Members were negotiating in Geneva , would make the most important contribution 
to reducing trade costs in a given country. 
73. The development of those OECD indicators had closely followed the scope and structure of 
the Geneva negotiating text.  They were meant to  help countries prioritize TF actions domestically 
and to better target technical assistance. 
74. The OECD had designed these indicators transparentl y so as to allow them to be regularly and 
frequently used by each and every WTO Member, without  any need for the OECD to do that. It was a 
tool the OECD prepared for Members' use in the pr ocess of planning the implementation of the future 
Trade Facilitation Agreement. 
75. The first tentative results showed that among the measures that were discussed in Geneva,  
the ones relating to transparency, to the availability of information, to advance rulings, to document 
harmonization and simplification as well  as measures related to procedures , risk management and the  TN/TF/M/33 
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like seemed to have a significant impact on trade costs and their introduction seemed to contribute 
very significantly to reducing those costs. 
76. The OECD intended to hold a TF expert meeti ng next June, in Paris, to fine-tune the 
construction of those indicators and to validate th e results. Several delegati ons would be contacted 
and invited to that meeting.  
77. The representative of the World Bank said that everybody knew what the Annex D 
organizations were involved in in  terms of supporting the TF negotia tions.  Annex D of the General 
Council's July package decision really placed a sp ecial responsibility on those organizations to 
support the negotiations.  Paragraph 4 of that Annex stated that Members should seek to identify their 
trade facilitation needs and priorities, particularly developing and least-developed countries, and 
should also address the concerns of those countries re lated to the costs.  The Annex D organizations 
had taken that to mean more than just the costs but to refer to the implementation challenges more 
broadly.    
78. All of the Annex D organizations had a lot of e xperience in the identification of needs and the 
delivery of technical assistance and capacity build ing (TA&CB) support.  Pa ragraph 8 of Annex D 
stated that, in order to make TA&CB more effec tive and operational and to ensure better coherence, 
Members invited the relevant organizations, incl uding the IMF, the OECD, UNCTAD, the WCO and 
the World Bank to undertake a collaborative effort in that regard. 
79. That was what the organizations had been doing. As the WTO had informed, there were now 
89 national needs assessments that  had been conducted, using a tool and a process that had been 
developed by the Annex D Group.  All of the Anne x D organizations had been actively involved in 
the conduct of those assessments. 
80. They had also been very heavily engaged in trying to build bridges between Geneva 
negotiators and the capital-based expe rts because they considered this to  be a practical agenda.  It was 
important to bring negotiators together with the capital-based experts. 
81. The Annex D organizations had also been h eavily involved in assistance for determining 
technical assistance needs and priorities. It was very  encouraging to note, as had also been mentioned 
in the reports by several delegations on their need s assessments, that a lot of work was already being 
done in each of the Member countries and that there was a certain level of compliance already achieved. 
82. All of the Annex D organizations had also been  heavily involved in sharing good practice,   
both through the production of information docum ents but also through regional and national 
workshops in Geneva and elsewhere.  They had ca rried out some research work on the costs and 
challenges administrations, particularly customs ad ministrations, faced when implementing the kind 
of measures discussed in Geneva.  They had produced  a report on that a few years ago as a  collective 
piece of work.  It was currently being reviewed a nd would potentially be updated to precisely reflect 
the negotiating agenda.   
83. Most importantly, the Annex D organizations were  interested in implementation.  They felt 
that the agenda negotiated in Geneva was very prac tical and very useful, and they would like to see an 
early adoption of at least the measures that  were contained in the new TF Agreement. 
84. In looking at how to assist with the implementa tion of those measures, they thought about the 
issues that developing countries faced. A first ne ed was to accurately identify where a country was 
relative to the negotiating agenda, what gaps exis ted and what TA&CB needs had to be addressed in 
order to move forward. TN/TF/M/33 
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  85. They were also trying to help in terms of  identifying the key implementation priorities 
because each country differed.  There was an agenda , but every country had its national priorities and 
the emphasis given to the implementation of the me asures would depend in part of that.  Members, 
particularly the LDCs, were very interested in ha ving a sense of confidence that, if they agreed to 
those measures and they were included in the Tr ade Facilitation Agreement, the required support for 
implementation would really be forthcoming.  Many Members were interested in early 
implementation because they all accepted that practic ally everything on the negotiating agenda had a 
positive Trade Facilitation impact. 
86. It was also known that many of the measure s being negotiated in Ge neva did not require 
TA&CB support.  They required government decisions  and a commitment to implement them.  This 
also had to be considered in this process. 
87. Over the past 6 months the Annex D organiza tions had thought about the most appropriate 
way for them to make a further contribution to this  process.  At the moment, they were working very 
hard on developing an approach to planning effectiv e implementation. In order to know how to help 
countries plan for the implementation of the measur es, they were currently developing a so-called 
"how-to-guide" for planning the implementation process.   
88. The intention was to pilot test this approach in the coming months in one particular Member 
administration, to fine-tune the process further, shar e the results with negotiators and then do another 
pilot to finalize it.  Once that was done, there w ould be a guide which was not a content guide but a 
process guide.  It would be designed to help Memb ers do their own planning for implementation.  
Unlike the needs assessment process that many countr ies had gone through, looking at what was on 
the agenda and where one stood, the focus of this pr oject would be on what a Member needed to do to 
implement in the future and wh at its TA&CB needs might be. 
89. The Annex D organizations believed that ma ny Members would need some support to 
undertake this planning exercise from development professionals as opposed to content specialists.  
When this guide was available as a WTO document for all Members, some would need assistance to 
undertake this planning exercise.  Using the guide, they themselves would chose their development 
partners, whether that would be the Annex D Group or individual Members of that Group or 
somebody else.  If, for example, a country alread y had a TF programme with USAID or the EU of 
DFIF or any of the development agencies, it might chose them as the appropriate development partner 
to assist them with the planning process.   
90. The advantages of the approach were fairly  clear.  The Annex D organizations had 
collectively spent lot of time establishing Trade Facilitation Groups or Committees to manage the 
needs assessment process. Some of them might be  going into a less active mode following the conduct 
of the needs assessment, but those groups existed and could be used to coordinate the work on 
implementation.  The logical next step, the pla nning activity, was a natural progression from the needs 
assessment work already carried out.  Knowing wh ich measures a country was already in full (or 
partial) compliance with, as well as those it did not yet implement, was a useful basis for the next 
phase of work.  The planned next activities would build upon the work alr eady undertaken without 
replacing it.  
91. Members could use the outcome of this planning exercise as a vehicle for dialogue with 
development partners in looking at a programme  of implementation support, both in terms of 
technical assistance and capacity-building support.  It also ensured that the planning process would 
take into account existing modernization activiti es and reforms.  It would avoid the kind of 
duplication one sometimes observed and would allo w for a much high level of coherence between 
development partners, which was very important.    TN/TF/M/33 
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92. When visiting the heads of customs in many countries, one could see that there was no 
shortage of plans.  In fact, there were usually too many, such as one from the EU Commission, one from the WCO, the diagnostic and implementati on framework from the World Bank and an IMF 
report.    
93. Part of the process would be to look at what was already happening on the ground, what the 
development priorities were, to consolidate that wo rk and to incorporate within it the implementation 
of the measures discussed in Geneva.  One of the concerns they had had from the beginning was that 
the implementation of specific measures should not take energy away from wider Trade Facilitation initiatives that were already underway.  This was w hy they would incorporate them and build some 
coherence. 
94. It was also planned to build a very strong country ownership and commitment based on 
national priorities.  It was not the priorities of the donor, nor that of the Member or the community one was working with.  Rather, the focus was on the specific national priorities and this agenda would 
be incorporated with different emphasis based on a co untry's respective priorities.  It would certainly 
contribute to effective donor coordination as well.  Fo cusing on each particular national priority in a 
unique way was very important.  The development pa rtners often had very good ideas, but sometimes, 
if they did not work more closely in line with th e national priorities and national circumstances, they 
could make some errors and sometimes th ings did not work as well as they should. 
95. The Annex D organizations were very committ ed to supporting this process and they would 
all, individually and collectively, do what they could to continue to support the negotiating process 
and, ultimately, the implementation of the agreed measures.  
96. The Negotiating Group took note of the statements made.  
B.  A D HOC ATTENDANCE OF RELEVANT INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS , INCLUDING THE 
IMF,  OECD,  UNCTAD,  WCO  AND THE WORLD BANK, AT THE NEXT MEETING OF THE 
NEGOTIATING GROUP  
97. The Chairman suggested inviting relevant inte rnational organizations, including the IMF, 
OECD, UNCTAD, WCO and the World Bank to attend the next formal meeting of the Negotiating 
Group on an ad hoc basis, as provided for in the Work Plan. 
98. It was so agreed. 
C. O THER BUSINESS  
99. The Chairman addressed the issue of the Nego tiating Group's next meeting, suggesting to 
hold it from 8 – 12 March.  Details regarding its content and structure would be communicated to 
Members in due course.  
100. It was so agreed.  
101. The Negotiating Group took note of the statements made. 
102. The meeting was adjourned. 
 
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