Does the war on terror become trade barrier?

The “war on terror” looks like unrelated to global trade, but it really have a significant effect on global trade. This kind of effect has become barriers of trade. Since September 11^th, 2001, for the security reason, U.S. government increased the inspection on the ports and customs. The products imported from other countries need more time for security inspection, which caused the additional fee and more shipping time. The additional fee and shipping delay increased the cost of the products, which declined the comparative advantage of these imported goods. Especially from developing countries, the products from these countries have an advantage of labor price. The increased costs decreased the demand of these products.

The oil price has a direct effect on the shipping fee, which is an important factor in global trade. The “war on terror” caused the great need of energy. In the other side, some oil exporter countries get involved in the war, so the instability of these countries also caused the increase of the oil price. The increase of the oil price also becomes the barrier for the international trade.

For U.S., the “war on terror” cost a lot of money, which accelerated the country’s economy recession, and result of the decrease of consumption. A lot of daily goods in the U.S. are imported from other countries, so the decrease of consumption decreased the demand of import.

The “war on terror” is to protect the country, so the barrier it caused is not the fault of the government. To decrease the effect on the international trade, the government can make some policy to improve the efficiency of the inspection. Such as to develop the technology, which use internet system to get the whole information of the import products before they arrive the port. Also, if the import goods are important to the countries, U.S. can lower the tariff as subsidy of the increase cost.