Key International Organizations in Trade and Development
International Organizations
Associations are found around the world for a particular purpose: to help the population economically, socially, and in health.
Encourage:
- Economic growth
- Good functioning of the regions
- Good relations, as well as partnerships with other countries
- Increased foreign investment
World Bank
Dedicated to providing financing, advice, and research to developing nations to aid their economic advancement.
Acts as an organization that attempts to fight poverty by offering developmental assistance to middle- and low-income countries.
Functions: Helps countries improve access to world markets and enhance their participation in the global trading system.
Main Pillars:
- Trade policy and trade integration.
- Business results.
- Competition policies.
- Trade facilitation and logistics.
PROGRAM
The Trade Facilitation Support Program (TFSP) was launched to assist developing countries in aligning their trade practices with (WTO TFA): World Trade Organization Trade Facilitation Agreement.
It provides practical and demand-driven assistance, and supports client countries with:
- Identifying existing constraints and bottlenecks to cross-border trade;
- Designing and planning for the implementation of reforms
International Monetary Fund
The International Monetary Fund is an organization of 190 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world.
The Objective
Avoid crises in the system, encouraging countries to adopt well-founded economic policy measures to ensure the stability of the international monetary system.
The IMF has three ways to ensure stability: keeping track of the global economy and the economies of member countries; lending to countries with balance of payments difficulties; and giving practical help to members.
World Economic Forum
The World Economic Forum (WEF) is a private, international, independent, and non-profit organization.
It involves business, political, intellectual, and social leaders at the global level, who are committed to improving the state of the world and seek to influence industrial, regional, and global agendas.
The WEF has different platforms that focus on specific areas. The ones focused on International Trade are:
- Shaping the Future of Trade and Global Economic Interdependence: This platform works to support debate and collaborative action on international trade and investment for recovery, growth, and sustainable development.
- Shaping the Future of the New Economy and Society
- Shaping the Future of Financial and Monetary Systems
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC)
APEC is a regional economic forum established in 1989 to leverage the growing interdependence of the Asia-Pacific. APEC’s 21 members aim to create greater prosperity for the people of the region by promoting balanced, inclusive, sustainable, innovative, and secure growth and by accelerating regional economic integration.
- APEC ensures that goods, services, investment, and people move easily across borders. Members facilitate this trade through faster customs procedures at borders.
The three pillars of APEC:
- Liberalization of trade and investment
- Facilitation to do business
- Economic and Technical cooperation
The Committee on Trade and Investment (CTI) provides a forum for APEC’s 21 member economies to deliberate trade and policy issues. It works to reduce impediments to business activity in the areas outlined by the Osaka Action Agenda.
The objectives of CTI are to:
- Create a coherent APEC perspective and voice on global trade and investment issues and increase cooperation among members on key issues.
Inter-American Development Bank (IADB or IDB)
The Inter-American Development Bank is the largest source of development financing for Latin America and the Caribbean. Established in 1959, the IDB supports Latin American and Caribbean economic development, social development, and regional integration by lending to governments and government agencies, including State corporations.
- It promotes private sector development in Latin America and the Caribbean and supports the development of member markets. It also helps medium and small enterprises with their innovation and growth.
- The IDB Trade Finance Facilitation Program (TFFP) currently offers loans, as well as guarantees.
- Social Entrepreneurship Program provides grants to private, non-profit, community-based organizations and public local development institutions.
- The LACEA-IDB-CAF-Trade, Integration, and Growth Network (TIGN) aims at building a network of economists working on issues related to the linkages between trade, integration, and growth, with a focus on Latin America and the Caribbean.
Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development works on issues related to economic, social, and environmental change, including issues such as regulatory reforms, development, and international trade. The OECD is open to entry by members from around the world and currently has 34 member countries in Europe and North and South America.
Its purpose is to solve economic and social problems by helping to increase the level of life expectancy.
The OECD has developed a set of Trade Facilitation Indicators (IFCs) that identify areas for action and enable the potential impact of trade facilitation reforms to be assessed.
World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
The World Intellectual Property Organization is the global forum for intellectual property services, policy, information, and cooperation.
We are a self-funding agency of the United Nations, with 193 member states.
Its mission is to lead the development of a balanced and effective international IP system that enables innovation and creativity for the benefit of all.
The World Intellectual Property Organization was created to promote and protect intellectual property (IP) across the world by cooperating with countries as well as international organizations. It began operations on April 26, 1970, when the convention entered into force.
WIPO’s activities include hosting forums to discuss and shape international IP rules and policies, providing global services that register and protect IP in different countries.
International Maritime Organization (IMO)
The International Maritime Organization is a specialized United Nations agency responsible for maritime safety, navigation effectiveness, and the prevention and control of marine pollution caused by ships.
The objective of this Convention is to facilitate maritime transport by simplifying and minimizing formalities, documentary requirements, and other procedures for the entry, stay in port, and departure of ships carrying out international journeys.
Maritime Single Window (MSW) – Recommended in the FAL Convention, encourages the use of the “single window” concept, to enable all the information required by public authorities in connection with the arrival, stay, and departure of ships, persons, and cargo, to be submitted via a single portal without duplication.
World Customs Organization (WCO)
The World Customs Organization is an intergovernmental body. Its mission is to improve the effectiveness of customs administration by creating international instruments that harmonize customs systems and effective communication between member states.
Trade facilitation, in the context of WCO, means the elimination of unnecessary trade restrictions.
The WCO has launched an initiative in the field of preferential rules of origin to ensure that Customs administrations have available all the necessary tools and modern techniques to ensure that the rules are developed, clearly understood, and implemented in a manner that promotes legitimate preferential trade while, at the same time, preventing abuse of the system.
World Trade Organization (WTO)
The World Trade Organization regulates trade between countries in order to maintain the trade balance between exports and imports. Under the Marrakesh Agreement, WCO’s mandate: provides a negotiating forum that facilitates the implementation and operation of multilateral trade agreements. Administers the dispute resolution mechanism and provides a multilateral monitoring mechanism for trade policies and cooperates with the IMF and the World Bank to achieve greater coherence in the design of global economic policies.
The Pre-shipment Inspection Agreement seeks to establish regulations for pre-shipment inspection.
International Chamber of Commerce (ICC)
The International Chamber of Commerce was founded in 1919. The objective of the ICC is to ‘act in favor of business interests by promoting trade and investment, opening markets for goods and services, and the free flow of capital’. Works in areas such as arbitration, banking, competition, e-commerce. More than 130 countries.
Many of the rules and guidelines developed by the ICC have an impact on trade facilitation. The Uniform Rules and Uses relating to Documentary Credits (RUUs).
International Air Transport Association (IATA)
The International Air Transport Association is the trade association for the world’s airlines, representing some 290 airlines or 82% of total air traffic. Today it has some 290 members from 120 nations in every part of the globe.
Supports many areas of aviation activity and helps formulate industry policy on critical aviation issues and helps airlines to operate safely, securely, efficiently, and economically under clearly defined rules.
It works with (ICAO) and (OECD).
Aviation’s role on trade facilitation:
- E-Freight, reducing waiting times and processing costs at borders and airports
- IATA Cargo Border Management Capacity Building
- Collaboration with the Global Alliance for trade Facilitation to deliver projects that help implement the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement.
International Chamber of Shipping (ICS)
The International Chamber of Shipping is one of the main international organizations of the international shipping industry, representing the ship-owners and operators of the sector.
- The main functions of the International Chamber of Shipping are related to all the technical, legal, labor, and political issues of the international marine transport.
- ICS represents shipowners with the various intergovernmental bodies that regulate shipping. First is the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO), where ICS was the first shipping industry association to be granted consultative status in 1961.
Latin American Confederation of Custom Agents (CLAA)
The Latin American Confederation of Custom Agents is a body that represents customs agents and customs representatives to facilitate their foreign trade operations.
This organization helps in foreign trade since it helps customs agents do the documentation well and thus export the products legally without any problem in addition to helping transporters in the field of trailers.
International Federation of Customs Brokers (IFCBA)
The International Federation of Customs Brokers represents custom brokers worldwide and its defense is the main task of the entity.
- It assumes its representation before the various international bodies linked to the profession and also has an outstanding training work. Currently, it is made up of professional associations from 26 countries.
- The entity works to keep customs brokers at the heart of the international trading system, promoting the value of its services and their use around the world, as well as to achieve an improvement in customs policies and practices, for the benefit of themselves and their customers.
United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development was created in 1964 to promote the integration of developing countries. UNCTAD has evolved in an effort to guide current debates on trade and development policies, ensuring that national policies and international action are aligned.
- UNCTAD helps developing countries leverage international trade, investment, financial resources, and technology to achieve sustainable and inclusive development.
The organization develops three key functions:
- It acts as a forum for intergovernmental discussions, supported by expert opinion and exchange of experiences aimed at building consensus;
International Telecommunications Union (ITU)
The International Telecommunications Union is the specialized agency in telecommunications of the United Nations (UN), in charge of regulating telecommunications at the international level between the different administrations and operating companies. Its headquarters are in the city of Geneva (Switzerland).
- It develops standards that facilitate the effective interconnection of national communication infrastructures with global networks, allowing a perfect exchange of information, be it data, faxes, or simple telephone calls, from any country;
Functions in International Trade
- Inform members about activities and financial situation
- Effective management of the Union
- Intersectoral coordination of activities