ABSTRACT
For many years after their independence the trade policies of the South Asian countries were inward-looking and highly interventionist. 1 Trade liberalization started in Sri Lanka during 1977 with a sharp devaluation and a series of sweeping trade policy reforms. Gradual reform got under way in the rest of South Asia about 10 years later during the second half of the 1980s, and continued into the 1990s. During this period most QRs were removed, tariffs reduced and exchange rate regimes liberalized. In India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Nepal this process continued from the second half of the 1990s and during the first five or so years of the 2000s, albeit unevenly and with backtracking episodes along the way. In Bangladesh, however, a major reversal of its earlier trade liberalization started in 1997 and continued during the first decade of the 2000s.
