Differences in introduction are delaying digitization in shipping

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The disparity in progress on digitalisation in maritime in different parts of the world was highlighted by speakers at the Marinetech conference in Singapore.

Speakers from the Digital and Green Corridors panel at the Singapore Maritime Week conference highlighted the huge difference between ports such as Singapore and Rotterdam, which are currently developing a digital and green corridor, and many other ports that still rely heavily on paperwork .

Pascal Ollivier, Chair of the Data Collaboration Committee, International Association of Ports and Harbors, noted that Singapore has a very progressive environment with the digital port, but it’s not like that everywhere. The reality in other places was somewhat different due to the lack of both standards and data. “Most of the time we live in a world made up of paper, PDF, email and What’s App.”

Ollivier said today that there are a number of countries moving towards implementing the Maritime Single Window by January 1, 2024, as defined by the International Maritime Organization (IMO), but there have also been a large number that are not system to get data about a port call. He gave the example of Fiji, where 75 documents are required for ship clearance, all either on paper or emailed.

Martijn Thijsen, Head of Ecosystem and Platform Play Digital Strategy and Transformation, Port of Rotterdam, saw the need to allow different speeds of adoption between those catching up with commons and ports like Rotterdam and Singapore trying to lead to take on in digitization.

“I think the discussion here this week should be how we can walk and run at the same time,” he said.

For example, when it comes to port call optimisation, all regulatory measures are in place, but the “migrants” have a lot of catching up to do in order to be able to globalize this. “But can we walk the corridor with the fast movers at the same time and comply with global standards, because that’s the only way we have adoptions.” Otherwise more industry-specific standards would emerge – a situation that nobody wants.

It would require finding common denominators for global standards that would sometimes require the faster runners to slow down a bit, but also the walkers to sometimes go faster and adopt new ideas.

Andre Simha, Global Chief Digital and Innovation Officer, Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) and Chair of the Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA), said the relative creation of standards is the easy part, but the hard part is driving adoption .

“So we need to find ways to encourage adoption as a DCSA. And of course we as carriers also agree, because if MSC advertises a certain standard to its customer base, but the other carriers don’t, it doesn’t work. That’s why we’re doing it together,” he explained.

Source: News Network

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