Australia and Singapore have announced the implementation of blockchain technology to facilitate the transfer and exchange of digital documents, under the trade economy agreement between the two nations.
Technology blockchain Blockchain has a wide range of applications that facilitate processes in various industries and sectors, and which is being increasingly exploited: the digitalisation and management of documents. In this area, the characteristics and potential of blockchain make document management much simpler but also highly reliable and transparent. And it is because of this potential that Australia and Singapore are adopting blockchain.
These nations celebrated, in August, the signing of the Australia-Singapore Digital Economy Agreement, also known as DEA, which brings the two countries together on economic matters. In the DEA, both nations established new global benchmarks for trade rules between their countries, in addition to a series of practical cooperation initiatives that seek to reduce the current barriers to the development of digital trade, creating an environment in which businesses and consumers can participate in and benefit from digital trade and the digitalization of the economy.
Thus, under this agreement, the Australian Border Force (ABF), the Singapore Customs Office and Singapore Media Development Authority (IMDA), signed an alliance to develop an innovative digital system based on blockchain, which improves and facilitates the exchange of commercial documents between both countries.
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Start of the first tests
Pilot testing on the development of this digital system began this week, the Australian ABF shows on its website. release, the ABF reports that the first test was conducted with Singapore Customs and the Singapore Information and Communications Development Authority (IMDA) on November 23.
This test consisted of testing a digital verification system, which is the first to be developed by experts from these countries using blockchain technology, and which seeks to facilitate the exchange of commercial documents between both governments. This first implementation of the technology will allow organizations to test digital verification platforms, both in the intergovernmental ledger (IGL), which was developed by the ABF, as in the TradeTrust from IMDA, designed for the management of electronic business documents.
The organisations are hoping that businesses, companies and regulators in Australia and Singapore will test the system and provide feedback on their experience of using it. The ABF also notes that the aim of the system is to reduce high administration costs and increase business efficiency.
Paving the way for “paperless trade”
This was stated by the ABF commissioner, Michael Outram, who assured that the close collaboration between both nations is paving the way towards a highly efficient, safe, reliable and “paperless” commercial relationship.
“The Australian Border Force (ABF) is developing solutions to make cross-border trade simpler and paperless for Australian businesses, in line with the bilateral Australia-Singapore Digital Economy Agreement.”
It is no secret that document management is one of the most complex activities in any industry, and due to the high volume of documents handled by companies and businesses, it requires complicated processes to detect duplicate information and to be able to organize the information efficiently. In fact, there are studies that reveal that most companies dedicate a large part of their staff to document management activities, searching for and organizing the paper information handled by those companies.
Therefore, the solution presented by Australia and Singapore seeks to break with the chaos generated by the management of commercial documents in the traditional way, integrating blockchain as the best ally to simplify this task. Here, this technology will play an important role, allowing the organizations involved to keep an exact and unalterable control of the documents related to the cross-border trade carried out by both countries.
It is expected that by early 2021, the ABF and the participating organizations will present a report on the experience of using the digital verification system, in order to carry out an in-depth analysis of the tool and design the necessary improvements to optimize the service.
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