While much has been said about the need to promote intraregional trade and the importance of reducing associated trade costs, quantitative estimates of such costs have been lacking. In this paper a new comprehensive measure of international trade costs is applied to calculate, according to...

This paper evaluates the potential contribution of both trade and non-trade specific business facilitation measures to trade and export competitiveness, as well as the potential gains from adopting a more integrated and coherent approach to trade and business (investment) facilitation.

This paper explores the trade facilitation performance of India and Mekong countries using a new measure of bilateral comprehensive trade costs, complemented by a review of specific trade policy and trade facilitation-related indicators. A model of comprehensive trade costs is then developed and...

There is ample evidence that successful implementation of bilateral or regional trade and economic integration initiatives would have a very significant impact on intraregional trade in Asia and the Pacific. However, little is known about the level of intraregional trade costs in the region and...

This paper presents findings from an initial analysis of new non-tariff trade cost estimates and their determinants, based on a bilateral database of comprehensive trade cost maintained by ESCAP. Results of the non-tariff policy-related trade costs modeling exercise strongly suggest that...

The authors use newly collected data on trade and production in 178 countries to infer estimates of trade costs in agriculture and manufactured goods for the 1995-2010 period

The authors use newly collected data on trade and production in 178 countries to infer estimates of trade costs in agriculture and manufactured goods for the 1995-2010 period. The data show that trade costs are strongly declining in per capita income. Moreover, the rate of change of trade costs...

This paper evaluates the potential contribution of both trade and business facilitation measures to trade and export competitiveness, as well as the potential gains from adopting a more integrated and coherent approach to trade and business (investment) facilitation. The analysis confirms that...

While much has been said about the need to promote intraregional trade and the importance of reducing associated trade costs, quantitative estimates of such costs have been lacking. A new comprehensive measure of international trade costs is applied in this paper to calculate ad valorem trade...

The World Bank and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) jointly prepared a new global data set of bilateral trade costs based on trade and production data. Accessible on the World Bank Open Data Web site, it opens new analytical possibilities for...