The long and winding road : how WTO members finally reached a trade facilitation agreement

The paper chronicles the negotiating history of the recently concluded Trade Facilitation Accord. Analysing the various stages of the decade-long effort to get the Agreement off the ground, it examines what was at stake in the negotiations, how they evolved and why they finally succeeded - despite many obstacles and detours along the way. The study also suggests ways in which the exercise has broken new ground – for Trade Facilitation rule-making at the global level, for how WTO Members negotiate agreements, and for the world trading system as a whole.