Facilitating India’s Act East Policy: Gap Analysis in Infrastructure at Land Custom Stations in the North Eastern Region of India

Abstract

The study has identified infrastructure gaps and assessed the quality of existing infrastructure at all the Land Customs Stations (LCSs) and Integrated Check Posts (ICP) in the North Eastern Region (NER) of India and North Bengal. The study has also covered four ICPs outside NER - Jogbani, Raxaul, Petrapole and Attari to benchmark the availability and quality of trade infrastructure in NER. The survey instrument took into account five infrastructure categories (basic utilities, cargo handling, digitization, public utilities, and design and safety covering 43 infrastructure elements. The study finds that that none of the surveyed LCSs or ICPs had all 43 infrastructure facilities. In terms of quality of infrastructure, it was found that many infrastructure facilities, though available were of poor quality. The study proposes region wide and state wide recommendations for policymakers.