TRADE/CEFACT/2000/32TRADE/CEFACT/2002/41
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UNITED
NATIONS
Distr.
GENERAL
TRADE/CEFACT/20021/4135/Rev.1
7 August4 June 20012
Original: ENGLISH
ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR EUROPE
COMMITTEE FOR TRADE, INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT
United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT)
Eighth session, 27 and 28 May 2002
REPORT ONF THE EIGHTH SESSION
- 1. The United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT) held its eighth session in Geneva on 27 and 28 May 2002 under the chairmanship of Mr. Christian Frühwald.
2. Participants in the meeting included representatives of the following countries: Australia, Belarus, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Canada, Costa Rica, Cuba, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Hungary, Iceland, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Malawi, Mauritius, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Poland, Republic of Korea, Republic of Moldova, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, United Republic of Tanzania, United States of America, and Yugoslavia.
3. The following intergovernmental organizations participated: Bank for International Settlements (BIS), Danube Commission (CD), European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), League of Arab States, and World Customs Organization (WCO).
4. The following United Nations bodies, regional commissions and specialized agencies were also represented: International Telecommunication Union (ITU), United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) and theand the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO).
5. The following non-governmental organizations participated: International Article Numbering Association (EAN International), the Iran Chapter of the International Article Numbering Association (EAN Iran), International Association of Ports and Harbours (IAPH), International Electro-technical Commission (IEC), International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), and International Organization for Standardization (ISO), as well as S.W.I.F.T.
GE.02-32340
6. Observers present at the invitation of the secretariat included representatives of: Asia Pacific Council for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (AFACT), European Electronic Messaging Association (EEMA), International Federation of Inspection Agencies (IFIA), International Multimodal Transport Association (IMMTA), Organisation for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), Trade Development Switzerland, Interfaith International, Speed Motif.
Note: Decisions madetaken during this meeting are shown in boldface bold typefacetype in the current report.
Introductory remarks
7. Mr. Christian Frühwald, Chairman of UN/CEFACT, opened the meeting by welcoming the delegations and requesting them delegations to participate actively in the deliberations on a number of highly important issues regarding UN/CEFACT’s future.
8. The Director of the Trade Division of UNECE, Ms. Carol Cosgrove-Sacks, addressed the meeting on behalf of the Executive Secretary, Ms. Brigita Schmögnerová, expressing the secretariat’s gratitude to the working groups for their deliverables. She pointed out that the UN/CEFACT Plenary session was opening the most high-profile trade facilitation week ever in UNECE history. Immediately after the Plenary session, an “International Forum on Trade Facilitation: Trade Facilitation: Simpler Procedures for World Trade Growth” was being will be held, organized with with around over 500 participants expected from all over the world. In addition, a “Round Table on Trade Facilitation in Ttransition Eeconomies and Lland-locked Ccountries” was being held ill be organized on 31 May 2002 to discuss some current aspects regarding the implementation of trade facilitation tools. She thanked the different UN/CEFACT working groups for their assistance in preparing the Forum and the Round Table.
9. She said that tThThe United Nations was focusing is focused on implementing the Millennium Declaration on poverty alleviation, which was aimed at spreading the benefits of globalization and of sustainable development in all its aspects. UN/CEFACT stood is right at the centre heart of globalization with its recommendations and the work to promote global trade. Its work fitteds well into the higher-level context of the Millennium Declaration.
10. At the beginning of his second term of office, the Secretary-General had called for strengthening the organization. The United Nations regional commissions would ill be expected to play an very active role in the global processes of the United Nations and this was is likely to emphasize the global role of UN/CEFACT.
11. UNECE’s The Trade Development Programme , she said, of the UNECE hads already been streamlined as part of these processes and a recent reorganization of in the secretariat hads taken account of the streamlining. The new Global Trade Solutions Branch now compriseds a set of dynamic teams, including e.g. UneDocs, the Mediterranean Project, and Trade Facilitation in the Russian Federation. The Policy and Government Cooperation Branch integrateds the servicing of all subsidiary bodies, including UN/CEFACT, with the Committee for Trade, Industry and Enterprise Development (CTIED). Thus, the Secretary of the Committee, CTIED, Ms Virginia Cram-Martos, was currently is now responsible for the UN/CEFACT Plenary session and Mr Mr. Mika Vepsäläinen hads been nominated secretary of the Plenary.
12. The Director of the Trade Division further went on to explained that tThe new focus will meantt that UNECE still needed s to maintain its work on norms, standards, recommendations and best practice, but, at the same time, wasis expected to play a role in the relevant policy dialogue. In addition, implementation and capacity building were are particularly relevant to important in transition economies.
13. TShe said that tThe International Forum on Trade Facilitation on 29 and 30 May 2002 formed s part of the new strategic approach to raise the profile of the work being done by UN/CEFACT and UNECE on work on trade facilitation. The Forum had been proposed is being organized at a proposal of by the delegation of the United Kingdom made at the seventh UN/CEFACT Plenary in March 2001. Thanks to the Governments of the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, many representatives of transition and emerging economies and developing countries could be invited to participate.
14. Another important future orientation includeds the role of UN/CEFACT in the United Nations N ICT (Information and Communication Technology (ICT)) Task Force and the forthcoming World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). UN/CEFACT should define its role in the process and see how it could an contribute to the European Regional Summit in Bucharest 7 – 9 November 2001, for which UNECE was is the regional focal point.
Agenda item 1 - Adoption of the provisional agenda
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/1/Rev.1 / Revised provisional agenda for the eighth UN/CEFACT Plenary session15. The Plenary approved the revised provisional agenda (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/1/Rev.1) with the changes in the documentation as specified in TRADE/CEFACT/2002/INF/1.
Agenda item 2 - Confirmation of the report from the UN/CEFACT March 2001 Plenary
TRADE/CEFACT/2001/35/REVev.1 Report of the seventh session of UN/CEFACT, March 200116. The Plenary confirmed the approval of the report of the seventh session of UN/CEFACT (TRADE/CEFACT/2001/35/REV.1).
17. The document referred to in para 44 and approved, in principle, at the seventh 7th session, will be circulated on a CD. The document can be downloaded from the Working Group’s web pages.
Agenda item 3 - UN/CEFACT Steering Group (CSG) reports
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/INF. 2 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG Chair to the UN/CEFACT PlenaryTRADE/CEFACT/2002/3 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG, 30 March 2001, Geneva
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/4 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG, 14 – 17 May 2001, Geneva
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/5 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG, 3 – 6 September 2001, Rotterdam
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/6 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG 19 – 22 November 2001, Geneva
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/7 / Report of the UN/CEFACT CSG 25 – 28 February 2002, Geneva
Additional documentation:
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/15 / CSG roadmap explaining details on the EWG CC project:
UN/EDIFACT Working Group: the EWG Project Team related to
ebXML (CC and BP)
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/37 / CSG roadmap explaining the ebXML projects relationships:
UN/CEFACT ebTWG project organization
18. The Chairman of the UN/CEFACT Steering Group (CSG) summarized his report and noted that there were are no items for decision-making. The CSG hads met during more than over 60 working days over the past last year and a large amount of work hads been done. A short presentation on ebXML would ill be made during the current session, later in the day, as well as another on the Service Provider.
19. The Plenary noted the report of the CSG Chairman.
20. The Plenary endorsed the reports from CSG meetings held:
· 30 March 2001 in Geneva (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/3)
· 14 – 17 May 2001 in Geneva (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/4)
· 3 – 6 September 2001 in Rotterdam (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/5)
· 19 – 22 November 2001 in Geneva (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/6)
· 25 – 28 February 2002 in Geneva (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/7).
21. It was agreed that CSG reports would ill be sent to Heads of Delegation for information within a month of being cleared by the CSG.
Agenda item 4: Proposal for Restructuring of UN/CEFACT Plenary and Groups
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8 / Proposal for Future Structure and Organisation of the UN/CEFACT Permanent Working GroupsTRADE/CEFACT/2002/31 / Proposal for the establishment of a policy group and a promotion and communication group
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/33 / UK comments on the new structure
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/34 / Republic of Korea’s comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/35 / SWIFT comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/36 / IPTWG comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/39 / Belgian comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/INF.7 / Italian comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8
TRADE/CEFACT/2002/INF.9 / Further Comments on TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8 jointly submitted by the Delegations of France, Germany and the United Kingdom
Proposal on the new structure
22. The Chairman introduced the issue by listing the documentation distributed to the delegations, including, including informal documents 6, 7, 8 and 9.
23. He began by emphasizing that the eighth plenary session was the most important UN/CEFACT meeting in the pastlast five years as it needed to reflect the successes into its structure so that the outside wworld outside could see it not only as a technical body, but also as a significant policy arena. Trade facilitation wasis the bedrock of UN/CEFACT, and constituted it is more than trade procedures, including as it did oes areas such as the rationalization and harmonization of trade procedures, business process information modelling (buy, ship, pay), benchmarking, metrics and best practice, as well as policy issues. To be able to continuously maintain the delivery of end results at the current high level, it was is important to enhance interaction between the groups and focus more on aspects such as policy and communications.
24. The CSG Chairman then briefly summarized the history from WP.4 to the current structure in place and then outlined the proposed new structure: the Pplenary would ill remain the Centre’s highest decision- making body and the Ssteering Ggroup its tactical implementation and coordination body. Five groups were are suggested as main bodies for undertaking or supporting the programme of work, while working groups, as sub-elements of the groups, would ill be dedicated to specific tasks. Projects would will be the work products of a group or a working group.
25. Three “operational” groups would ill include: (a1) the international trade and business process group (TBG); (b2) the information content management group (ICG); and (c3) the applied technologies group (ATG). These would ill be assisted by two “support” groups: the techniques and methodologies group (TMG) and the legal group (LG). The Forum will would be managed by a Forum Management Team (FMT), consisting of the chairpersons and vice- chairpersons of the groups. The allocation of specific items into the new groups had been is specified in detail in document TRADE/CEFACT/2002/8. The Chairman then concluded that it would ill take a little time to ensure that the current work hads been transferred to the correct organization, and thus some flexibility as to the exact placement would be the responsibility of the new organization. The first meeting of the Forum Meeting would ill be held in Geneva in September 2002.
26. In the future, all groups would ill meet at the Forum twice a year, in global hub cities. However, this did oes not exclude groups, working groups or project groups additionally meeting when and where they wished. The Forum would ill thus be a significant promotion and communication event.
27. The UN/CEFACT Chairman then presented his and the secretariat’s additional proposal on the policy and communication groups. Maintaining UN/CEFACT achievements in the future was is extremely important but even more important wasis the work on ensuring that UN/CEFACT could an keep its role as one of the leading trade facilitation bodies with a global remit; h. Hence, thea proposal for the policy and communication groups. ??
28.
29. Offering the floor to delegations, the Chairman requested that to focus the discussion focus on clear priority setting. The allocationseparation of management of the work to the proposed FMT would ill allow CSG to concentrate focus on larger issues. He reminded participants that the written comments by the delegations should also be taken into account in finalizing the new structure.
30. The Head of Delegation of the United Kingdom referred to the additional paper (TRADE/CEFACT/2002/INF/9) prepared in cooperation with the delegations of France and Germany. It was is very important to recognize the significant role of the work carried out by UN/CEFACT. The TBG would ill bbe the core of the Forum and the paper TRADE/CEFACT/2002/33 defineds in more detail what the other activities should be. Working groups should remain empowered and all groups needed to work in a highly integrated, democratic and transparent way.
31. The CSG would be tasked with implementing the structure, taking fully into full account the comments made at the Pplenary. Currently, theThe key issue now was is to redirect the work of the groups, the CSG and the secretariat to prepare a complete project database as soon as possible.
32. The Head of Delegation of Belgium restated the Belgian position as expressed in TRADE/CEFACT/2002/39, summarizing that the delegation doesid not wish to “disorganize” UN/CEFACT but sought stability. The role of the CSG should also be defined within the new structure. but instead striveds for stability, and particularly, a clear definition of the role of the CSG within the new structure.??MIKA The delegation would like to keep the present structure with the CSG and the EWG, and rather, develop it them further. He also requested that national delegations should listen to their technical experts. He pointed out the views of the Belgian users – and particularly those of customs – who found that the new structure provided an inadequate voice for constituencies and it was hisd delegation’s view that users should be provided adequate “space” in the UN/CEFACT structures. He then made referenced to the deliberations of the EWG session held in Washington in March 2001 and the recommendation to keep the present structure where the final users wereare properly represented.