The president of the Consejo Nacional de la Empresa Privada (CONEP), José Manuel Paliza, told the news media that tariff considerations do not constitute the main source of problems standing in the way of smoother trade relations between the two nations which share the island of Hispaniola.
Instead, he thinks that bureaucratic impediments on both sides of the border hurt bilateral trade more than anything else. Speaking in the context of a recent visit paid by President René Preval of Haiti to the Dominican Republic, Mr. Paliza pointed out that the country transacts business with other partners under the same tariff structure with much better results. According to him, frontier checks and other dubious dealings along the Dominican-Haitian border are at the core of many of the difficulties plaguing bilateral trade. Nonetheless, he agrees that tariffs should be gradually reduced to face the new challenges introduced by the globalization of trade.