Paperless trade


Paperless trade refers to “trade taking place on the basis of electronic communications, including exchange of trade-related data and documents in electronic form” in the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific, adopted at United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific in May 2016.
The enormous costs arising from the exchange of billions of trade-related documents, as well as the complexity of international trade documents and procedures, are a huge burden on businesses, and a major disincentive to many small firms for participating in international trade. Switching from paper documents would increase security and transparency in supply chains and provide governments and the private sector with higher revenues. Paperless trade aims to making cross-border business transactions more convenient and transparent while ensuring regulatory compliance.
In the report of “Paperless Trade in International Supply Chains: Enhancing Efficiency and Security”, paperless trade is discussed from the perspectives of countries and private enterprises. It points out that the advance exchange of information and the automated analysis of trade data enable governments and enterprises to react faster on events and take appropriate measures to reduce costs and risks.

Paperless trade facilitation measures

The implementation of paperless trade has increased significantly in the region of Asia and the Pacific. In contrast with Trade Facilitation measures, most paperless trade and, in particular, cross-border paperless trade measures, are not specifically featured in the WTO TFA, but drafted in the bilateral trade agreements. In 2015, the UN ESCAP collected and listed paperless trade and cross-border paperless trade measures as follows:
Depending on how specific they are and the structure of each agreement, these measures may be found in e-commerce, customs or trade facilitation chapters. For example, in the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, access to and use of the Internet for Electronic Commerce could be found in the chapter of E-commerce, which requires parties to “recognise the benefits of consumers in their territories having the ability to:
access and use services and applications of a consumer’s choice available on the Internet, subject to reasonable network management;
connect the end-user devices of a consumer’s choice to the Internet, provided that such devices do not harm the network;
access information on the network management practices of a consumer’s Internet access service supplier.”