I still don't know much about the Trade Facilitation Agreement, but law prof Antonia Eliason does, and she has written an article about it. Here's the abstract:
This article provides a first analysis of the new WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement, tracing it from its origins in pre-GATT conventions through its mandate in Articles V, VIII and X of the GATT to its present form. As the first such in-depth examination of the agreement, which was agreed at the December 2013 Bali Ministerial, the article shows how the Trade Facilitation Agreement has managed to balance the goals of economic efficiency, regulatory choice, and developing country support. I argue that the Trade Facilitation Agreement is a significant step forward for the international trading regime, representing a new hope for the relevance of the WTO, particularly in light of the previous failures of the Doha round and the increased regionalization of international trade.
Trade facilitation is designed to cut the red tape surrounding the actual movement of goods across real, physical borders. Among the key accomplishments of the Trade Facilitation Agreement is the inclusion of specific measures to help developing countries build capacity and implement the provisions of the agreement. The Trade Facilitation Agreement also takes into consideration regulatory concerns of WTO members, through the extension of the applicability of the general GATT exceptions to the new agreement. While the Trade Facilitation Agreement may appear narrow in scope, addressing procedural border measures, it is, the article argues, the broadest WTO Agreement besides the GATT, since all goods that cross national borders find themselves subject to trade facilitation measures. If the Trade Facilitation Agreement is properly interpreted, the combination of capacity-building measures, a focus on technological improvements and the judicious invocation of Article XX could result in a win-win situation wherein routine positive trade is streamlined, reducing time required to cross borders, while negative trade is more easily controlled and regulated at the border.
Despite certain regulatory questions concerning implementation, it is likely that the net effect of the Trade Facilitation Agreement will be to reduce the cost of trading across borders, while improving trade for developing countries and allowing WTO members to better control trade flows, through a combination of procedural streamlining and regulatory discretion.
