Glossary of Customs and Trade Terms

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NAFTA	North American Free Trade Agreement. In June 1991 the United States, Canada and Mexico initiated negotiation of a comprehensive free trade agreement aimed at: eliminating over a mutually agreed upon time period all tariffs on trade between the three countries; reducing impediments to trade in services; removing most restrictions on foreign investment among the signatory countries; ensuring adequate intellectual property protection. The negotiations were concluded in August 1992, and the draft text is structured along the lines of the U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement. The Clinton administration negotiated supplemental agreements on labour and environmental issues, and Congress approved the whole package of NAFTA agreements in November 1993. NAFTA went into effect January 1, 1994.
Nairobi Convention	The expression commonly used to refer to the international Convention on mutual administrative assistance for the prevention, investigation and repression of Customs offences adopted by the WCO in Nairobi in 1977. (WCO)
NGO	Non-government organisation(s)
NMCC	National maritime Coordination Centre
non tariff barriers	Barriers to an exporter to a foreign country that are not tariff/tax related and include quarantine restrictions, quota and other restrictions such as labelling. They make the importation of the goods into the country difficult and/or costly.
non-market economy	A national economy in which the government seeks to determine economic activity largely through a mechanism of central planning, as in the former Soviet Union, in contrast to a market economy which depends heavily upon market forces to allocate productive resources. In a ‘non-market’ economy, production targets, prices, costs, investment allocations, raw materials, labour, international trade and most other economic aggregates are manipulated within a national economic plan drawn up by a central planning authority; hence, the public sector makes the major decisions affecting demand and supply within the national economy.
NPPC	National Passenger Processing Committee. ACS chairs the NPPC, which advises on policy relating to passenger processing. It also coordinates the activities of the nine Commonwealth departments and agencies represented on the NPPC.