Parallel Session D12: 3rd NTFC Global Forum-Closing ceremony

Barbados prioritises trade facilitation at key supply chain forum

The supply chain forum, dedicated to trade facilitation, concluded with a session that underscored the event’s significance and the commitment of the Barbadian government to the discussed matters. Lisa Cummins, Barbados’ Minister of Energy and Business, highlighted the importance of the forum by noting her exemption from a Cabinet meeting, a testament to the government’s prioritisation of the forum’s agenda under the leadership of Prime Minister Mia Amor-Mottley.

Cummins reflected on the forum’s rich, fruitful, and inclusive discussions, which brought together government officials, industry representatives, and international partners. She emphasised the necessity of collaboration among various stakeholders, including port communities, UNCTAD, multilateral development banks (MDBs), and the private sector, which was identified as a key takeaway.

The forum addressed the urgent need to mitigate supply chain disruptions, a lesson learned from the COVID-19 pandemic when trade facilitation measures and the work of National Trade Facilitation Committees (NTFCs) were crucial in delivering essential supplies. The discussions also highlighted the pivotal role of digitalisation and technology in the future of trade facilitation, with a focus on blockchain, artificial intelligence, and the need for more transparent and efficient processes.

The critical role of customs authorities in facilitating trade was stressed, with a call for strengthened collaboration between NTFCs and customs administrations. The private sector’s role was acknowledged as vital, with public-private partnerships deemed essential for addressing challenges such as supply chain resilience and border compliance. The forum also recognised the need for strategic capacity building and clear communication with private sector entities, including port agents.

Resource mobilisation was discussed as a significant challenge, with a call for more streamlined support from international partners, and an emphasis on inclusivity to ensure that small traders and women in trade are not overlooked.

Shamika N. Sirimanne of UNCTAD provided a comprehensive wrap-up, highlighting the convergence on the need for political will, technology leverage, and stakeholder collaboration for successful trade facilitation efforts. The NTFCs’ role in crisis coordination was recognised as increasingly important, with a focus on adaptation strategies to global shocks such as supply chain disruptions and climate change.

Private sector engagement was reiterated as key to reform success, and inclusivity and sustainability in trade facilitation were also discussed, with strategies for empowering small traders, promoting gender mainstreaming, and pioneering climate-smart practices.

Resource mobilisation was identified as a perennial issue, with the need for long-term engagement with donors and development partners to support the complex trade facilitation reforms. Sirimanne encouraged the community of practitioners to maintain close contact and support each other, acknowledging the slow but significant progress in the field.

The session concluded with an affirmation of the ongoing commitment to work together to address daily challenges and improve the lives of people within the community. Poul Hansen closed the session and reminded participants of the continuation of the supply chain forum with a focus on gender equality in supply chains.

The forum’s discussions underscored the complexity of trade facilitation reforms and the need for a multi-faceted approach that includes technology, collaboration, inclusivity, and sustained international support.

Lisa Cummins:
Good afternoon, everyone. To say that this has been an incredible two days would be an understatement, but suffice to say that on Thursdays, for as long as I can remember, the Cabinet of Barbados, chaired by the Prime Minister, whoever that Prime Minister is at the time, but presently, the Honorable Mia Amor-Mottley sits in session. The Cabinet is sitting as we speak, and I’ve been there all day, but Prime Minister Motley believes that this forum, this supply chain forum, and this particular conversation on trade facilitation is so important that she has agreed that I could be excused from Cabinet to come and join you in order to be able to close this session. So I think I will leave you regrettably once we have wrapped up, and I will have to go back to Cabinet, but just to say to you that the government of Barbados and the people of Barbados, certainly under the leadership of Prime Minister, assign significant, a high level of responsibility to our leadership to support the work that is being undertaken here and to our processes. So as I come this evening to conclude our deliberations over the last day, from all I have seen, from the moment that I opened as part of the panel yesterday until now, the discussions have been rich, they have been fruitful, they have been inclusive, they have looked at every perspective, both from the government side, we have had industry representatives included, and I am confident that we will set the stage for a revamped approach to national trade facilitation committees that takes into account the insights that we have derived from the last two days of deliberations. I want to highlight a number of takeaways that we want to emphasize, and the first and foremost issue we want to raise is of course that of collaboration. We started out talking about collaboration, we started out talking about the role being played by our communities, our port communities, the resources that we are working with from our partners in UNCTAD and all of the other MDBs, and of course the critical responsibility assigned to our private sector partners. The second takeaway that I want to focus on is how those relationships will help to mitigate supply chain disruptions and how we have a role in ensuring that first integration into the supply chains in the first instance and the incorporation of measures to mitigate against those disruptions will be to our benefit. We have recognized in Barbados and certainly among this group, the essential role that can be played by national trade facilitation committees including not just our regular imports of goods on a daily basis, but critical life saving equipment and supplies as we saw most recently during the pandemic where many ports around the globe closed and we were unable to get critical supplies, but it was our trade facilitation measures and it was the work of trade facilitation committees and partners that allowed us to get critical supplies into the country. One of the other tenets that we have spoken about over the last two days and certainly is a priority for Barbados is digitalization and technology and certainly the discussions here have raised the importance of integrating elements relating to blockchain, artificial intelligence, recognizing the importance of increased transparency and more streamlined processes in order to make trade facilitation more efficient. Finally, the role of customs authorities in facilitating trade cannot be understated even slightly. We have emphasized the importance of strong collaboration between our national trade facilitation committees and customs administrations. The work of UNCTAD, the work of the World Customs Organization and all of our partners will be essential to delivering results to our people. Here in Barbados, as I close, I want to just point out that not only are we talking about the work being done by customs, but all of the private sector actors, including customs brokers and their agents who are inputting data into systems like Assecuta on behalf of consignees. Colleagues, as you leave this session, I want to close out by acknowledging the important role to be played by our private sector partners. They are perhaps three quarters of the equation on the receiving end. Public private sector partnerships are essential for tackling challenges like supply chain resilience and border compliance. We need clear communication, strategic capacity building for the private sector, including the port agents that I spoke about, and a mechanism for addressing specific concerns that are crucial for fostering active and meaningful engagement. The resources to be able to do all that I have just outlined will be necessary for us to collaborate with the multilateral development partners. They remain for certainly countries like ours an area of critical concern. We are very grateful to the partners who have worked so far with us, UNCTAD, the UN system and all of the other agencies, but we continue to call for more streamlined support in a number of areas. We must not forget the importance of inclusivity. In the process, small partners get lost. Small cross broader traders, women in trade typically find themselves facing very specific challenges and they require our attention. And so I want to call on all of our partners here today to map a clear pathway forward that allows for us to integrate all of the elements of which I have spoken, of which you have all spoken, and all the things that have remained unspoken but need to be integrated into the conversation. And to give the commitment of the government of Barbados and the governments, I’m sure, on most of the countries across the region who are here and all of the SIDS who are here and who will be transitioning in another couple of days to another location to continue looking at the issues facing SIDS, that we will continue to work together to tackle the issues that confront us on a daily basis that make life easier for people, the people who constitute our committees, our communities, the people who are our neighbours, our sisters, our friends and our family. All of you constitute that family and we are committed to working together with you. Thank you all very much.

Poul Hansen:
Thank you very much, Minister, and also thank you to your Prime Minister for releasing you this afternoon for the closing of this forum. Let us give another applause to the Minister and our gracious host here for this forum. Thank you very much. So it is now my only task left is to hand over to the Director of the Division of Technology and Logistics in UNCTAD or UN Trade and Development, apologies, Shamika Sirimanne, who will close this forum. Shamika.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thanks. Thanks, Poul. Your Excellency, Minister of Energy and Business, Ms Lisa Cummins, thank you for being with us. Excellencies, distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, and as Poul mentioned, this has been our third successful NTFC Global Forum. We started the very first one in January of 2017 in Geneva. And then, of course, the second one was in February of 2022 and it was hosted virtually because we were struck down with COVID-19. And here we are in Bridgetown, Barbados for the third NTFC Global Forum. And we had two days of intense discussions and 12 sessions. And these sessions focused on dialogues and discussions around the role of the NTFC, covering a wide variety of aspects of trade facilitation, working with the private sector, as Minister, you mentioned. And there was a lot of conversation around the green trade facilitation, inclusivity, sustainability, resilience, and so forth. But the key point of convergence was sharing good practices and also lessons, what we should do and what we shouldn’t do as we push forward with trade facilitation reforms. As during past NTFC forums, this edition would not have been possible with the close collaboration of our partners, including our host, the Government of Barbados, CARICOM, ECLEC, Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, ITC, OECD, UNEC, WCO, WTO, and all the amazing speakers and interventions that we have heard over the last two days. So thank you so much to all of you. And it’s because of you that we had this successful session. So I mean, it’s a difficult thing to summarize because you had very intense conversations and I was just sitting in the lunch, the last lunch, and then you said, okay, we are going to speak very frankly and openly. And then you had a very open and frank conversations. So there are many points came through, but let me try to summarize because, you know, I said at the end of the meeting, we had to do some summary. One of the things that you really discussed very deeply was that what factors determines the success of a national trade facilitation committees. And it came very clearly, the political will and the political support, the leveraging technology for the implementation of the, you know, all measures of the WTO TFA. And you emphasize a lot about the coordination and collaboration among stakeholders and the capacity building and importance of sharing experience directly between countries. And I think this is, this in fact is a community, what you have developed is a community of practitioners from across the world. Because when you hear the conversations that you have had, there are a lot of commonalities come to the picture, you know, where you can push forward, where you have the political will. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a SIDS or a large economy or a landlocked economy. And where you manage to get the private sector is where you can, you know, again, push forward with reform. So we heard many commonalities. So my advice to you is as you go forward, keep a close community among yourselves, because the trade facilitation reforms are difficult and they’re not fun. And you really need a kindred soul to listen to you. So please have that conversation as we finish and go back. And one of the important thing also that came up in your conversations with that adaptation strategies are becoming a lot more important today when confronted with all kinds of shocks, such as the supply chain disruptions, disaster, humanitarian crisis, climate change. And I think this conversation started because of COVID-19. And I think the National Trade Facilitation Committees were given a new role. How do you coordinate in a crisis like that? And we saw in many countries, some countries managed to keep the National Trade Facilitation Committee running and to coordinate the facilitating, you know, the humanitarian and the essential goods into countries, and they succeeded. So there was a whole conversation about building awareness of to the adaptation strategies through National Trade Facilitation Committees. And then, of course, the private sector engagement, it’s a, you know, it’s a conversation we always have had when we talk about the National Trade Facilitation Committees. And you said that if they are continuously engaged, and if there are results, and you will have the private sector in your journey. But otherwise, you will not have the private sector, and it will be much more difficult to push forward reforms if the private sector is not on board. And you also talked about inclusivity and sustainability in trade facilitation, where you examine the role of NTFCs, and to discuss the strategies for empowering small traders, promotion of gender mainstreaming, and pioneering climate smart trade facilitation practices. And these are also emerging as new issues that you’re paying a lot more attention now, because we are in a new normal, where we need to be paid a lot more attention to these issues. And I think some of you also mentioned, yes, it is very important to have women in trade facilitation, but you said, let us also strive to work and improve on the inclusion of the youth and people with disabilities. And to me, that’s also a new thing that is emerging, you know, as a responsibility of the National Trade Facilitation Committees, and these are all noble endeavours. And of course, you know, resource mobilisation is the classical story of, you know, our sad story, because much of the time, the trade facilitation reforming, we know, you know, as practitioners, the trade facilitation reforms are very difficult reforms. They don’t get done in a couple of capacity building sessions, and some funds being thrown, and they are, you know, the donors, the development partners need to be engaged with you in the long haul. And so the resource mobilisation came again and again, as a big issue. And I think what, to me, and when I was talking to my colleagues, what struck me is that, you know, how bored you were to bring these issues to the table and have a very honest conversation about what works and what doesn’t work. These good practices and lessons are extremely important for you, as, you know, community of practitioners, sometimes for you to feel good, because you know that you have not been able to push things far enough, but you would know it is the same in many places, because they are not easy reforms to push. Because to push national trade facilitation reforms, you need to get the buy-in from so many ministries. And these are the finance ministries of your countries, the trade ministries, the transport, the environment, they’re big, you know, big ego ministries, you need to get them all together, you need to push them all forward. And in many times, it’s not the ministers who are pushing it, it would be you, and the people who are, you know, providing the ministers with the briefing notes, that you are the real pushing, you know, of the national trade facilitation reforms. So this is, I think, in a way, it’s good that you keep in touch so that you know and you can feel good of the amount of work that you have done in your countries, and to also realize that, you know, it’s slow, it’s a slow process. But that’s what it is in this field. So all of this information that you have shared among yourselves and with us, and this will be made available in the subsequent to the forum, my colleagues have already taken notes. Now, of course, you know, you need to go home and translate what we have talked about. But we also understand, you know, be kind to yourselves, because, you know, that it is how it is. And let me also say that we are always with you, and we are just a telephone call away from you, and or just, you know, a WhatsApp, and we will always be with you in the long haul, because we understand that, you know, there are difficult reforms. Thank you so much.

Poul Hansen:
So thank you. You didn’t say that this track is closed, but I guess it’s closed by now. But it doesn’t mean that the supply chain forum is over. We continue tomorrow morning at nine o’clock, and I think there is a very interesting session charting new horizons, gender equality, and supply chains. So please do not go out and spend all your money tomorrow morning, but please contribute in the session tomorrow, and we look forward to see you at nine o’clock. Thank you very much. Have a good evening.