Handbook on Provisions and Options for Trade in Times of Crisis and Pandemic
This Handbook explores options for provisions that could be used in future RTAs to better guide how trade could be conducted during future crises. It covers all the major rules areas in RTAs, including Essential Goods and Services, Trade Facilitation, SPS and TBT Measures, Intellectual Property Rights, Digital Trade, Transparency, and Development. The options for provisions include “baseline”, “baseline+”, and “discretionary” options, depending on the extent of obligations, protection, resilience and policy space provided by those provisions.
UN Course based on the Handbook: https://www.unescap.org/training/rta-ttcp
More information about the Initiative is available HERE.
FIATA eFBL Standard Package
The FIATA eFBL Standard Package was developed as part of the United Nations response to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic under the United Nations multiagency project “Transport and Trade Connectivity in the Age of Pandemics: UN solutions for contactless, seamless and collaborative transport and trade”.
Available via FIATA’s GitHub repository, the data standard is offered as open source for all software providers and industry stakeholders to implement. FIATA expects its standard to become the main global standard for all House Bill of Ladings, noting the compatibility with other BLs.
Training Manual on Logistics Information System
The “Training Manual on Logistics Information System” was developed as part of the activities of the UNDA project “Transport and trade connectivity in the age of pandemics: Contactless, seamless and collaborative UN solutions”.
Airship technology for air connectivity and humanitarian aid in the Caribbean and the Pacific
The Hybrid Airship transport alternative has the potential to be a game changing technology with significant development in recent years. The aim of this technical note is to help raise awareness on airships as an innovative mobile services technology.
Standardized Dataset Aligned to International Standards and UN/CEFACT Reference Data Models and Document Implementation Prototypes for CIM/SMGS set of Documents
This pilot project was initiated in the context of implementing the recommendations of the 2019 and 2020 UNECE “Odessa seminars” to support the development of digital multimodal transport corridors, to increase the harmonization and standardization of data exchange in international transport, trade and logistics, to encourage electronic data exchange and thereby to reduce person-to-person contacts during the COVID-19 crisis and in the post-pandemic recovery, using relevant UN/CEFACT standards.
This included: an analysis of merchandise and information flows along the Black Sea – Baltic Sea corridor as background information for the further development of the project. A set of electronic messages (electronic document equivalents) based on the UN/CEFACT standards and Reference Data Models, using XML and JSON formats, has been developed in collaboration with relevant UN/CEFACT experts and using their guidance on how the UN/CEFACT standards should be applied to develop electronic document-equivalents for CIM/SMGS documents, in particular:
- Packing List;
- SMGS Consignment Note;
- CIM/SMGS Consignment Note (BY);
- CIM/SMGS Wagon List;
- Invoice for Customs (in cooperation with the Ukrainian consultant in the project).
A survey and analysis took place on what was necessary to accomplish for a complete conversion of data between maritime, road and railway transport. The focus was on new standards for generic document equivalents, in order to look into possibilities for their pilot implementation under the United Nations Development Account (UNDA) coronavirus (COVID-19) response project “Transport and Trade Connectivity in the Age of Pandemics”. The consultant worked in the areas of:
- practical aspects of preparing electronic standards for data exchange and new message structure subsets contextualized to the specific transport modes, using UN/CEFACT standards that would best service digital multimodal corridors and support modern technologies, including XML and JSON;
- development and implementation of a data model for the Black Sea – Baltic Sea digital corridor, combining the data for key documents accompanying goods, as described above, as identified in the project, and based on the UN/CEFACT Multimodal Transport Reference Data Model.
The main objective was to foster the harmonization of electronic data sharing, using global (UN/CEFACT) standards for transport, trade, and logistics, and to prepare templates for electronic document equivalents based on the UN/CEFACT semantic standards and reference data models.
Implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for commercial contracts covering the transportation of goods in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond
With a view to increase awareness of Government officials and transport operators in Asia and the Pacific region on the ways of addressing some of the key legal implications of COVID-19 for commercial contracts covering transport of goods and to assist shippers and consignees, particularly in developing countries in addressing some of the key commercial law implications of the COVID-19 crisis, the UNESCAP secretariat conducted research and preliminary analysis of the challenges arising from the COVID-19 crisis affecting international commercial contracts, including contracts on international carriage of goods by various modes of transport, focusing particularly on land and multimodal transport.
Proposals for crisis-response provisions in regional and bilateral transport agreements of the ESCAP member States
Having faced the pandemic, most of ESCAP member States had to urgently issue ad-hoc policies and domestic regulations in attempts to prevent or limit the spread of COVID-19 disease through their borders, often without warning or consulting their counterparts and in breach of the rules of transport-related international legal instruments. This situation showcased that existing legal instruments covering international carriage of goods and passengers may lack provisions on cooperation while dealing with critical situations such as the current crisis or other potential extraordinary situations.
In this context, the UNESCAP secretariat took stock of the current bilateral and multilateral agreements on international road transport in Asia and the Pacific Region, analyzing, in particular, the availability of clauses related to crisis response and mutual assistance in emergency situations in those agreements. of information and may be subsequently updated.
Smart Railway Solutions for Trans-Asian Railway Network in the Times of COVID-19 Pandemic
To support trade and transport connectivity globally in times of pandemic the United Nation agencies have jointly launched a project titled- Trade and transport connectivity in times of pandemics: with overarching objective of developing contactless, seamless and collaborative solutions to preserve and further enhance the trade and transport connectivity. In Asia and the Pacific, ESCAP is leading the project and has initiated series of studies aimed at supporting countries in this direction.
The present study on smart railway solutions has been carried out under the project with aim to identify smart railway solutions that are proven to be successful elsewhere and are potentially replicable and scalable. Not all solutions would have equal importance or relevance for the railways of the region.
SMGS Consignment Note Standard Package
The SMGS Consignment Note Standard Package was developed as part of the United Nations response to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic under the United Nations multiagency project “Transport and Trade Connectivity in the Age of Pandemics: UN solutions for contactless, seamless and collaborative transport and trade”.
This electronic document equivalent Standard Package consists of the following elements:
COVID-19 and maritime transport: Disruption and resilience in Africa
Impacts of the COVID-19 disruption on maritime trade flows, port calls, and liner shipping connectivity in Africa.