New Delhi: National Committee on Trade Facilitation (NCTF) met Friday in New Delhi to discuss ways for developing the roadmap for implementation of WTO’s trade facilitation agreement.This was the first meeting of NCTE. Speaing at the meeting ,the Cabinet Secretary and Chairman of the NCTF, P K Sinha stressed on the need to continuously move towards higher standards of excellence so that trade eco-system becomes more growth oriented.Mr Sinha said, as the agreement may become a binding agreement shortly, India had to be in a state of readiness.

It was agreed to hold the next meeting in December and the Steering Committee will meet twice before that to come-up with specific goals for the implementation of the agreement.

All the 24 members attended the meeting alongwith secretaries of various ministries and departments like Home, Shipping, Civil Aviation.Speaking at the meeting, the Chairman of Central Board of Excise and Customs Najib Shah said that TFA on customs side is as important as GST in indirect tax reform.Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia spoke about the need to do away with the multiplicity of committees looking at trade facilitation at various levels.Commerce Secretary, Ms.

RitaTeaotia threw light on how India has engaged itself with the global developments on the WTO Agreement on Trade Facilitation and ratified it earlier this year.