Debroy suggests integrated digital platform for logistics
The government needs to move fast on creating an integrated digital platform that links all trade stakeholders and helps significantly cut down time and expenses on trade logistics, a research paper by economist Bibek Debroy and NITI Aayog official Kishore Desai has suggested.
Debroy, chairman of the newly constituted Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM), has called for trade facilitation to be prioritised and an integrated logistics policy to be put forward by the government.
Currently, different stakeholders in trade use different digital platforms. While an exporter will need to register and operate through the ICEGATE portal or SWIFT (singlewindow interface for facilitating trade) for customs purposes, he will also often be using digital platforms such as Visual Impex, the paper says.
Trade and taxation authorities themselves use a variety of conflicting software. Most of these platforms do not have interfaces and data exchange protocols with each other. As a result, each stakeholder continues to use its own platform, forcing trade to not only access multiple windows but also multiple exchanges of documents. This reflects in the country’s dismal ranking of 146 in the Trading Across Borders indicator of the World Bank’s latest Doing Business Report, the paper says.
While the Centre has recently moved forward in this regard by setting up a National Committee on Trade Facilitation under the chairmanship of the cabinet secretary as well as inaugurating a separate division for logistics within the commerce ministry, the government now wants states to also pick up the pace, a senior official in the ministry said.
Earlier this week, the new Logistics Ease Across Different States (LEADS) index developed by the commerce and industry ministry and Deloitte was launched. It ranks states in terms of the logistical support they provided to promote goods trade.