Customs Modernization And The International Trade Superhighway

In order for the ideal of international trade to become reality, customs procedures dating back centuries must be eliminated and replaced with modernized practices designed to foster cooperation and efficiency in world trade. The International Customs Modernization Process (ICMP), detailed in this remarkable book, will do just that. With the aid of modern technology and business practices, nations and industries will benefit through improved enforcement of customs, more streamlined trade of goods, and overall growth of economies. The ICMP is an 11 step process that begins by improving the fundamentals. It then outlines three enabling processes and concludes with implementation and integration of the process and a vision of the promised future.

With the intensified focus on antiterrorism in US trade policy — and the transfer of the Customs Service from the US Treasury Department to the Department of Homeland Security as the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection — traditional ways of thinking about customs and trade law are now out of date. In light of the war on terrorism and the emphasis on border security, businesses engaged in the cross-border exchange of goods face a multitude of new laws and initiatives — in addition to the traditional array of responsibilities required by the US Bureau of Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. While these regulations are intended to strengthen border security, without careful planning they may have the unfortunate result of hindering the efficient movement of goods. In addition to updated customs forms and helpful appendices, this third edition covers the burgeoning area of free trade agreements between the US and countries around the globe. These agreements are a critical aspect of US bilateral trade relations, affecting not only duty rates but also rules of origin and policies on investment, trade in services and access to Government procurement markets. In sum, this book is an invaluable tool for a host of international trade professionals including in-house counsel dealing with import-export issues, corporate logistic managers, regulatory and compliance managers, and import-export specialists.

Customs administrations around the world face new challenges: an increasing volume of international trade, a revolution in new technologies, and fundamental changes in business models. The benefits of a well-performing customs administration are clear, as is the need to develop efficient, effective, fair, and modern customs administrations. Customs Matters analyzes the many changes and challenges customs administrations face and pro-poses ways to address them. By offering a cross-sectional view of the main aspects of customs ad-ministration, the book guides policymakers and customs officials as they evaluate the current state of their customs system with a view to developing, reinforcing, or relaunching their own roadmaps for customs modernization.

Border clearance processes by customs and other agencies are among the most important and problematic links in the global supply chain. It takes three times as many days, nearly twice as many documents, and six times as many signatures to import goods in poor countries than it does in rich ones. Delays and costs at the border undermine a country's competitiveness, either by taxing imported inputs with deadweight inefficiencies or by adding costs and reducing the competitiveness of exports. As countries have come to realise the importance of trade in achieving sustainable economic growth they have progressively lowered tariffs, established regimes to encourage foreign investment and pursued opportunities for greater regional integration. This progress has, however, been undermined by the high costs and administrative difficulties associated with outdated and excessively bureaucratic border clearance processes which are now often cited as more important barriers to trade than tariffs. Inefficient border processing systems, procedures, and infrastructure result in high transaction costs, long delays in the clearance of imports, exports, and transit goods, and present significant opportunities for administrative corruption. They essentially undermine a country's competitiveness in the international marketplace. Governments around the world are therefore placing increased emphasis on border management reform designed to remove unnecessary barriers to the flow of legitimate trade across their borders. However, in spite of the widespread recognition of the need to improve the efficiency of border management regimes, Customs and other border management agencies in many countries have frequently paid lip service to the trade facilitation agenda. This book is designed to shed new light on these problems and to identify a range of strategies that will help officials meet their traditional control responsibilities while at the same time facilitating legitimate trade. It also provides advice to development professional and key policy makers about what works, what doesn't and why.

Trade integration contributes substantially to economic development and poverty alleviation. In recent years much progress was made to liberalize the trade regime, but customs procedures are often still complex, costly and non-transparent. This situation leads to misallocation of resources. 'Customs Modernization Handbook' provides an overview of the key elements of a successful customs modernization strategy and draws lessons from a number of successful customs reforms as well as from customs reform projects that have been undertaken by the World Bank. It describes a number of key import procedures, that have proved particularly troublesome for customs administrations and traders, and provides practical guidelines to enhance their efficiency. The Handbook also reviews the appropriate legal framework for customs operations as well as strategies to combat corruption.

The Regulatory Craft tackles one of the most pressing public policy issues of our time—the reform of regulatory and enforcement practice. Malcolm K. Sparrow shows how the vogue prescriptions for reform (centered on concepts of customer service and process improvement) fail to take account of the distinctive character of regulatory responsibilities—which involve the delivery of obligations rather than just services.In order to construct more balanced prescriptions for reform, Sparrow invites us to reconsider the central purpose of social regulation—the abatement or control of risks to society. He recounts the experiences of pioneering agencies that have confronted the risk-control challenge directly, developing operational capacities for specifying risk-concentrations, problem areas, or patterns of noncompliance, and then designing interventions tailored to each problem. At the heart of a new regulatory craftsmanship, according to Sparrow, lies the central notion, "pick important problems and fix them." This beguilingly simple idea turns out to present enormously complex implementation challenges and carries with it profound consequences for the way regulators organize their work, manage their discretion, and report their performance. Although the book is primarily aimed at regulatory and law-enforcement practitioners, it will also be invaluable for legislators, overseers, and others who care about the nature and quality of regulatory practice, and who want to know what kind of performance to demand from regulators and how it might be delivered. It stresses the enormous benefit to society that might accrue from development of the risk-control art as a core professional skill for regulators.

The global economy is undergoing dramatic financial changes. The removal of technical, trade, and monetary barriers and the liberalization of world economies create challenges and opportunities for investment and financial transactions. With these changes, international finance is expected to play a vital role in foreign exchange, cross-border capital flows, joint ventures, and economic growth, but rapid progress in telecommunications and electronic capital transfers could lead to tremors in financial markets, making the global economy vulnerable to speculation, investors' panic, and economic fluctuations. Supported by the latest empirical research, this book weaves together a theoretical framework of international finance supported by the latest empirical research. ^IGlobalization^R provides a comprehensive analysis of traditional and modern theories of international monetary systems, problems of balance of payments, exchange rates, and related adjustment and stabilization policies for industrialized and emerging nations. Following a brief historical review, the book covers advanced theories of international trade and finances as well as related real world performance. It examines strengths and weaknesses of fixed and floating exchange rates, forward exchanges, spreading global shareholder capitalism, problems of emerging markets, international capital movements and banking activities, market capitalization and foreign debt. It also examines investment movements and cross-border mergers, economic and financial integration, related effects of macroeconomic policies in open economies, and problems of global income inequalities. The book will be of great theoretical and practical importance to students, scholars, and business leaders.