Poor physical transport infrastructure – hard barriers to trade – has been improving in the Greater Tumen Region (GTR thereafter), but non-physical or institutional impediments – soft barriers – to border-crossing and behind-the-border barriers remain very high in the GTR. These barriers led to a call for identifying and removing them so as to encourage free movement of goods, services, and people in the region, thus placing trade at the core of the trade and investment facilitation agenda.

In order to strengthen Greater Tumen Initiative (GTI)'s four member governments’ (i.e. People’s Republic of China, Mongolia, Republic of Korea, and Russian Federation) mutual understanding of trade facilitation issues, enhance the transparency of trade-related policies, rules, regulations and practices; build up capacity in addressing bottlenecks that impede trade; and implement result-oriented projects, the GTI Trade Facilitation Committee (TFC) was established in 2011.

To identify bottlenecks for effective trade integration within the GTR, this study, jointly conducted by UNDP and GTI, provides policy recommendations to the TFC members for preparing a trade facilitation strategy that contributes to improving GTR’s competitiveness and trade expansion among countries in the region and with the rest of the world.