Notes From the Field: Making Trade More Efficient in Tunisia
About "Notes From the Field": With this occasional feature, we let World Bank professionals who are conducting interesting trade-related projects around the globe explain some of the challenges and triumphs of their day-to-day work. The views expressed here are personal and should not be attributed to the World Bank.
The interview below was conducted with Hamid Alavi, a senior private sector specialist and Regional Private Sector Development Coordinator. He oversees and manages the work program, projects and advisory services related to private sector development and competitiveness. He has published on access to finance, innovation, private sector development, enterprise competitiveness and trade facilitation, food security, telecoms, pollution control, trade finance, and export promotion.
Mr. Alavi spoke with us about the successful implementation of a single-window trade portal project in Tunisia. The project enhanced transparency of trade transactions and cut processing time at the Port of Rades from 18 days to two-and-a-half days during an 8-year period starting in 2000. In 2008, the project was featured in the International Finance Corporation’s “SmartLessons” series. In the interview, Alavi explains why it worked, despite some political resistance.
Picture a global supply chain. The 
It is far more expensive for Tunisia to trade manufactured goods with its next-door neighbor, Algeria, than to trade them with distant France. Similarly, the cost of trading agricultural goods between neighbors Algeria and Morocco is more than twice as high as it is between Algeria and Spain. What hinders countries that are so close to each other – and that share common languages and elements of culture – from exchanging goods?
Value chains are an ever more prominent feature of global commerce, with goods being processed – and value being added – in multiple countries that are part of the chain. No longer is trade as simple as manufacturing in one country and selling in another. Rather, goods often cross many borders, undergoing processing and accruing components in diverse settings before ending up in a retail store. A 
A company importing desktop computers into Russia expects border processing times of up to six weeks. Chinese customs authorities take so long inspecting drug shipments that a global healthcare company must hold nine days’ worth of inventory. Concerned about the prevalence of theft, a cell phone manufacturer must provide a security detail for overland shipments in Mexico.
As we gather in kitchens and dining rooms during this two-month stretch of eating and charity, let us pause for a moment to review the state of food trade in Africa: how fares cross-border commerce in key crops on a continent with pockets of harsh weather and unpredictable politics? How goes the traffic in grains and tubers?
In today’s interconnected world economy, efficient, reliable and cost-effective supply chains have become necessities in global trade. Trading in a timely manner with minimal transaction costs allows a country to expand to overseas markets and improve its overall economic competitiveness. For many countries, however, identifying bottlenecks along a supply chain and then determining which logistics procedures and infrastructure to upgrade can be a challenging feat.
