UNECE: Trade Facilitation and electronic business

• Use 40 policy recommendations for trade facilitation and 440 standards for e-business

• Get help establishing and operating a National Single Window to simplify and improve export and import procedures
• Analyse and simplify business processes to remove bottlenecks and enhance trade efficiency
• Promote paperless trade transactions

• Implement electronic alternatives to key paper documents in the international supply chain

• Benefit from advisory services and workshops to build the capacities of your trade facilitation institutions

UN/LOCODE is a code structure that makes trading simpler by attributing a unique five-character code to locations used in transport and trade, such as seaports, train stations, airports and road terminals. The system, developed in 1981, is used by most major shipping companies, freight forwarders and manufacturers. It is also applied by national governments.

UN/EDIFACT (Electronic Data Interchange for Administration, Commerce and Transport) was developed to facilitate the exchange of trade data between organizations with independent IT systems. It allows businesses or organizations, wherever they are, to quickly and securely exchange electronic documents such as purchase orders, cargo authorizations, etc. Today, UN/EDIFACT is used by almost all national customs administrations, all major seaports and a large range of companies.

In 2012, the Greek government developed a national trade facilitation strategy to promote economic recovery. The initiative focused on simplifying export and import procedures and reducing time and cost. With support from the programme, Greece managed to analyse, simplify and automate its trade and customs processes.

A Port Community System was established in Odessa and a national Interagency Working Group on Trade Facilitation and Logistics was created with support from the programme, and based on relevant UNECE Policy Recommendations. Follow – up projects on Maritime Single Window and National Single Window in Ukraine were launched.

With support from the programme, Morocco created a National Single Window for its foreign trade. The resulting solution, called PortNet, uses an integrated IT system to bring together all the stakeholders in the Moroccan port and foreign trade ecosystem. It has helped boost performance for operators while significantly reducing costs.

PortNet: A tool to facilitate the complete integration of the foreign trade for importers and exporters

The Trade Facilitation Implementation Guide (TFIG) is an interactive web-based tool that helps you build your knowledge and capacity to ease cross-border trade. Aimed at both the public and private sector, it helps you identify, examine and select possible paths and implementing tools for your policy objectives. Available in 5 languages, TFIG has proved to be very popular. Its website registered 290,000 unique visitors between 2012 and September 2015, and 1.9 million page views.

Find out more about TFIG

Fisheries Language for Universal Exchange (FLUX) is a unique communication tool that promotes sustainable fishery management. It allows Fishery Management

Organizations (FMOs) to automate the collection and dissemination of fishery catch data. This enables them to plan more sustainable management processes and detect and combat illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.
Discover more about the FLUX project