Trade ministers from four neighbouring countries met this week to discuss a proposed customs corridor that would let freight trucks cross shared borders without repeated inspections.
The proposal, first floated at a regional economic summit two years ago, would establish a single electronic manifest recognised at all border crossings along the corridor, cutting what officials say can currently be multi-day delays at some checkpoints.
“Every hour a truck sits at a border is a cost that eventually shows up in consumer prices,” said one trade ministry official involved in the talks. “This is about removing friction, not lowering standards.”
A joint statement said technical teams would report back within three months on a pilot phase covering a subset of border crossings, before any broader rollout is considered.
Several delegates cautioned that harmonising tariff schedules and customs valuation methods would likely take longer than the corridor’s physical and digital infrastructure, given the differing systems currently in place across the four countries.
