A Customs House in Amber

There is a window at the customs house in Santo Tomás de Castilla where a broker presents, in triplicate, a document that the same broker already submitted electronically the night before. The window opens at eight. The line forms at six.

Guatemala adopted a single-window system for trade in 2015. It is, on paper, among the more advanced in the isthmus. In practice the electronic submission is a prelude to the paper one, and the paper one is a prelude to an inspection whose schedule is set by the availability of a single scanner. The result is a customs clearance time that the World Bank measured at 72 hours and that brokers, off the record, measure at five days.†

The form was digitised. The queue was not.

Nothing here requires a law. It requires a director who removes the paper step, publishes clearance times by shift, and is prepared to be unpopular with the people who profit from the wait.

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† Sample figures; not independently verified.