Even as trade resumed across the Torkham Border earlier this year, importers continue to run into stumbling blocks as they scramble to get their goods approved at the border. Currently, twelve tankers loaded with LPG from the Central Asian states have been stranded at the border for the third consecutive day, attributing the interruption to approval delays by customs authorities. Now might be a good time to ask whether it is fair or even rational to keep tankers filled with highly flammable substances stranded and helpless at the border simply because they can’t conform to the pedantic rules and regulations needed to get a bureaucrat’s vote of confidence. It is difficult to sympathise with Pakistan’s bloated bureaucracy-its mere existence has become an anathema to the executive functioning of our state. Indeed, red tape has lost us a lot over the last few decades, choking developmental projects every step of the way. It appears that the enormous discretionary powers granted to the bureaucrat only serve to disempower everyone else. Governed by outdated rules and procedures, an elongated hierarchy and a complete disregard for modern technology, the civil service, particularly customs, is also rampant with corruption and nepotism. Those who call the shots at the borders are perhaps infected with the worst of it at all; extreme lethargy which when combined with an inability to navigate simple executive processes creates the problems we see at Torkham today. The bottom line is that bureaucracy simply slows down decision-making, disillusioning importers and entrepreneurs alike to the point where they no longer want to invest in Pakistan. Just last year, two shipments of vital oilseeds worth nearly $100m were held up at Port Kasim for over a month because the ministry for climate change abruptly decided to ask for a certificate that had not been required before. It’s difficult to determine which is worse-that we stopped the consignment without prior notice or that countless shipments of oil seeds were allowed to cross the border unscathed for years prior. Pakistan’s ambitious CPEC project with China has also been subject to numerous procedural delays, flattening trade prospects all along the way. *