Tariffs, Transport Costs and the WTO Doha Round: The Case of Developing Countries

The WTO Doha Round of multinational trade negotiations is labelled the “development round” to highlight the fact that progress could be achieved through the enhanced integration of the poor countries into the world economy. Since the trade agenda focuses to a large extent on the levels of direct and indirect trade barriers as well as other aspects of trade and competition policy, an important aspect of the relative trade performance of developing countries has been neglected somewhat. This paper argues that, in addition to trade barriers, other trade costs, such as communications and transport costs, have to be taken into account. These other costs can be significantly higher in developing countries, which impedes their successful integration into world markets.