TECH ASST.

closed

The overall objective of the Technical Assistance to Enhance Competitiveness Project is to help enhance export competitiveness and thereby prospects for sustainable rapid growth by facilitating private sector access to know-how for improved productivity, quality, design and response time, as well as diversification of export production. The project consists of: a) promoting the diffusion of good technology practices through a Technology Diffusion Scheme which will share the cost in improving the private sector's access to productivity, quality, and design services, and to information on new technologies; b) strengthening the MSTQ (metrology, standards, testing, quality) infrastructure to improve export quality; c) trade facilitation through the implementation of a program to speed up the process of trade documentation clearance, and to streamline critical procedural and operational areas in import and export documentation, with the aim of eliminating the need to physically present documents to the various organizations concerned. To ensure that these initiatives lead to tangible and early results, the project will also support the implementation of economic and regulatory reforms outlined in recent sector work, specifically provision of technical assistance: in restructuring the investment authorization process to improve the acquisition of foreign technology; in reviewing and restructuring the retirement savings system to improve flexibility in factor markets; and in developing competitiveness and productivity indicators to improve access to information by both the private and public sectors.