National Trade Facilitation Action Plan (NTFAP)

Finance Minister of India Arun Jaitley released National Trade Facilitation Action Plan (NTFAP), a 76 point National Action Plan which provides a time bound map, not only for implementing WTOs TFA (Trade Facilitation Agreement ) but also focuses on India’s initiatives for trade facilitation and Ease of Doing Business thus going beyond TFA. The plan is to be implemented between 2017-20 in a phased manner.

The actions covered under the plan have been categorised by prioritising the activities into short-term, mid-term and long- term.

Chronology of Events

1. India ratified WTO’s TFA in April 2016
2. Under Art 23.2 of TFA, a National Committee on Trade Facilitation (NCTF) headed by cabinet secretary was constituted in Aug 2016. It consists of stake holders from the government and the private sector including trade community.
3. WTO’s TFA came into force on 22^nd Feb 2017.
4. NCTF adopted 76 points National Trade Facilitation Action Plan

Aim of National Trade Facilitation Action Plan

The aim of NTFAP is to transform cross border clearance ecosystem through efficient, transparent, co- ordinate, digital and technology driven procedures which are supported by state of the art sea ports, airports and land labours.

Objectives

1. Improvement in Ease of doing business by the reduction in cargo release time and cost.
2. Move towards paperless regulatory environment, transparent and predictable legal regime.
3. Improve investment climate through better infrastructure.

Monitoring

National plan will be monitored by the steering committee (the operational arm of NCTF), chaired by revenue secretary and the commerce secretary. The plan would be reviewed by the cabinet secretary.

Other important points about NTFAP

1. The action plan lists out specific activities which would be carried out by all regulatory agencies like customs, FASSAI, Drug controller, Plant Quarantine, DGFT etc. in a time bound manner. The coordination among all the stake holders is the key to achieve the objective of trade facilitation.
2. The action plan is divided into two categories i.e. TFA and TFA plus. TFA category will cover activities coming under the WTO TFA while TFA plus category will go beyond the ambit of TFA
3. Infrastructure augmentation particularly road, rail and port are also part of the action plan.

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