India to reduce transaction costs for exports/imports significantly by using UN/CEFACT standards
Geneva, 17 October 2006 -- Over 250 experts from Africa, Asia,
Europe and North America attended the 9 th UN/CEFACT Forum in New Delhi1,
India from 2 to 6 October 2006. UN/CEFACT is the United Nations Centre
for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business and is hosted by the United Nations
Economic Commission for Europe in Geneva, Switzerland.
Mr. R.R. Shah, Member Secretary, Indian Planning Commission, stressed in
his inaugural address that “Expert knowledge and tools are needed to
adapt global standards and technologies to specific national and regional
requirements. The United Nations together with the Government of India should
cooperate to transfer this know-how and develop the required expertise in
India to support implementation”.
Mr. G.K. Pillai, Commerce Secretary, Government of India, indicated in his
welcome address that India aims to reduce the transaction costs of exports
and imports using UN/CEFACT standards.
During the week, 130 participants attended a two-day workshop on United
Nations electronic Trade Documents (UNeDocs). UNeDocs not only helps to reduce
costs in preparing export documents, it provides a roadmap for moving from
paper to paperless trade2.
For India, UNeDocs offers a way to leverage existing investments in its eTrade
programme3. It can serve
as a basis for data harmonization and exchange that can be adapted to the
different capabilities of trading partners.
In his opening address, Mr. Jairam Ramesh, the Indian Minister of State
for Commerce, presented the important advances that India has made in the
implementation of global standards, in particular UN/EDIFACT (EDI). This progress
has brought major benefits both to Indian trade and the Indian Government. “Our
priority is now to bring these benefits to the wider trade community, including
Small and Medium Size Enterprises, by introducing new and integrated technologies
such as UNeDocs”, Ramesh noted.
The Workshop recommended that the Indian Government and different stakeholders
in eTrade establish a pool of national experts to prepare for a UNeDocs implementation.
This activity could be the start for the development of an Indian Single Window.
Further, such an initiative in India could be an important contribution to
the emerging Regional Single Window in Asia Pacific.
Mike Doran, the newly elected Chair of the UN/CEFACT Forum, invited all
countries and stakeholders to join UN/CEFACT. “The implementation of
the latest standards and technologies can provide specific challenges to traders
from developing countries. The Centre’s mission includes the provision
of assistance to these countries through capacity-building, by transferring
knowledge, expertise and best practice”.
The Forum also produced other innovations in the field: the
publication of the Release Candidate Standard for 21 XML Schemas4 for
e-Tendering transactions.
In addition, much progress was made in New Delhi regarding the new D06B
of the UN/EDIFACT Directory for electronic data interchange and the completion
of the UN/CEFACT Modeling Methodology (UMM) Foundation module 1.0 and Base
Module 1.0. UMM allows business modelers to design trade processes. Software
designers can then produce Information Technology Applications, such as
ebXML and Web Services that are compliant with these processes. The UMM
user guide ”UMM in a nutshell” is now available.
The following Forum officials were elected for 2006-2008 in New Delhi:
Forum Management Group
Mr. Mike Doran, Chair
Mr. Anders Grangard, Vice Chair
International Trade and Business Process group (TBG)
Mr. Jean-Luc Champion, TBG Chair
Mrs. Pat Toufar, TBG Vice Chair
Applied Technologies Group (ATG)
Mr. Mark Crawford, ATG Chair
Mr. Jostein Fromyr, ATG Vice Chair
Information Content Management Group (ICG)
Mr. Mike Conroy, ICG Chair
Mr. David Dobbing, ICG Vice Chair
Techniques and Methodologies Group (TMG)
Mr. Günther Stuhec, TMG Chair
Mr. Christian Huemer, TMG Vice Chair
For further information please contact:
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1 The Forum was hosted
by Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Department of Commerce, National
Informatics Centre (NIC), Indian Ports Association, Indian Customs, Airport
Authority of India, Container Corporation of India, Air India, Indian Banks
Association, Reserve Bank of India, State Bank of India, National Informatics
Centre Services Inc., Major Ports of India, Air Operators Association.
2 Important standards and
tools available to simplify documents and data include: the UN Trade Data
Element Directory (UNTDED-ISO 7372), UN Layout Key, UN/EDIFACT, UN/CEFACT
Core Component Library, UNeDocs and WCO Data Models, UN/CEFACT Recommendation
No. 33 on Single Window, UN/CEFACT Core Component Technical Specification,
UN/CEFACT XML Naming and Design Rules Specifications.
3 http://etrade.gov.in
4 Extensible Markup Language
(XML) Schemas provide the means for defining the structure of a document.
One purpose is to define the difference between a valid document and an
invalid one.
Ref: ECE/TRADE/06/N01