IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/wbecrv/v35y2021i1p34-57..html

Trade Effects of Customs Reform: Evidence from Albania

Author

Listed:
  • Ana Margarida Fernandes
  • Russell Hillberry
  • Alejandra Mendoza Alcántara

Abstract

Despite enormous academic interest in international trade costs and keen policy interest in efforts to reduce them, little is known about the effects of trade facilitation measures. This study evaluates a significant Albanian reform that sharply reduced physical inspections of import shipments. An estimation strategy that isolates quasi-random variation in the allocation of shipments to physical inspections is used to show that reduced inspections significantly increase imports. Import flows that are observed least frequently see the largest trade responses to reduced inspections. The effect of inspections on imports is virtually independent of changes in clearance time and clearance time uncertainty. Tariff and other tax revenues collected at the border rise in direct proportion to growth in declared import value. There is no compelling evidence that reduced inspections increase evasive behavior, perhaps because most of Albania's imports are tariff-free.

Suggested Citation

  • Ana Margarida Fernandes & Russell Hillberry & Alejandra Mendoza Alcántara, 2021. "Trade Effects of Customs Reform: Evidence from Albania," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 35(1), pages 34-57.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:35:y:2021:i:1:p:34-57.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wber/lhz017
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or

    for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Carballo, Jerónimo & Schaur, Georg & Graziano, Alejandro & Volpe Martincus, Christian, 2016. "Transit Trade," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 7688, Inter-American Development Bank.
    2. Joël CARIOLLE & Cyril CHALENDARD & Anne-Marie GEOURJON & Bertrand LAPORTE, 2017. "Going beyond analysis of internal data to support customs modernization: a case study in Gabon," Working Papers P173, FERDI.
    3. Jerónimo Carballo & Georg Schaur & Alejandro Graziano & Christian Volpe Martincus, 2016. "Transit Trade," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 94658, Inter-American Development Bank.
    4. Carballo, Jeronimo & Graziano, Alejandro G. & Schaur, Georg & Martincus, Christian Volpe, 2025. "Import processing and trade costs," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    5. Christian Volpe Martincus, 2016. "Out of the Border Labyrinth: An Assessment of Trade Facilitation Initiatives in Latin America and the Caribbean," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 96856, February.
    6. Volpe Martincus, Christian & Sztajerowska, Monika & Santi, Mariana Belén, 2024. "Consumers and Firms in International Trade," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 13558, Inter-American Development Bank.
    7. Joel CARIOLLE & Cyril CHALENDARD & Anne-Marie GEOURJON & Bertrand LAPORTE, 2016. "Décloisonner l’analyse des données pour appuyer la modernisation des douanes : une illustration à partir du Gabon," Working Papers 201618, CERDI.
    8. Jaime de Melo & Zakaria Sorgho & Laurent Wagner, 2024. "Implementing the Trade Facilitation Agreement should boost trade among African Continental Free Trade Area members [La mise en œuvre de l’accord sur la facilitation des échanges devrait stimuler le," Post-Print hal-04478013, HAL.
    9. Jerónimo Carballo & Georg Schaur & Christian Volpe Martincus, 2017. "Transportation and Trade Interactions: A Trade Facilitation Perspective," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 97957, Inter-American Development Bank.
    10. Hayakawa, Kazunobu & Ito, Keiko & Fukao, Kyoji & Ivan, Deseatnicov, 2022. "The impact of the U.S.-China conflict and the strengthening of export controls on Japanese exports," IDE Discussion Papers 852, Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO).
    11. repec:idb:brikps:7994 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Hendy, Rana & Zaki, Chahir, 2021. "Trade facilitation and firms exports: Evidence from customs data," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 197-209.
    13. Laajaj, Rachid & Eslava, Marcela & Kinda, Tidiane, 2023. "The costs of bureaucracy and corruption at customs: Evidence from the computerization of imports in Colombia," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 225(C).
    14. Lionel Fontagné & Gianluca Orefice & Roberta Piermartini, 2020. "Making small firms happy? The heterogeneous effect of trade facilitation measures," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(3), pages 565-598, August.
    15. Volpe Martincus, Christian, 2016. "Out of the Border Labyrinth: An Assessment of Trade Facilitation Initiatives in Latin America and the Caribbean," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 7994, November.
    16. Li, Wenchao, 2019. "Time barrier to export for OECD countries," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 106-112.
    17. Marijke J.D. Bos & Gonzague Vannoorenberghe, 2019. "Imported input varieties and product innovation: Evidence from five developing countries," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(2), pages 520-548, May.
    18. Jerónimo Carballo & Georg Schaur & Christian Volpe Martincus, 2018. "Transportation and trade interactions: a trade facilitation perspective," Chapters, in: Bruce A. Blonigen & Wesley W. Wilson (ed.), Handbook of International Trade and Transportation, chapter 14, pages 422-450, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    19. Hayakawa, Kazunobu & Keola, Souknilanh & Urata, Shujiro, 2022. "Using truck probe data to measure border clearance time: evidence from thailand," IDE Discussion Papers 846, Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO).
    20. Horag Choi & Julio Mancuso & Christis G. Tombazos, 2021. "Trade facilitation in the presence of non‐independent impediments," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(9), pages 2604-2637, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:35:y:2021:i:1:p:34-57.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/wrldbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.