UNESCAP-UNCITRAL-ICC-ADB Webinar on Legal Aspects of Cross-border Paperless Trade Facilitation

Yann Duval is currently Chief of Trade Policy and Facilitation Section at UN-ESCAP, the regional branch of the United Nations Secretariat for Asia and the Pacific. Over the past 20 years, Dr. Duval has conducted research and delivered technical assistance and advisory services on trade policy and facilitation throughout Asia and the Pacific, including on the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement. He spearheaded the development of the Asia-Pacific Research and Training Network on Trade (ARTNeT), as well as, interalia, the creation of the ESCAP-World Bank Trade Cost Database, the UN Global Survey on Trade Facilitation and Paperless Trade Implementation and the online Trade Intelligence and Negotiation Adviser (TINA). Dr. Duval was also instrumental in the development of the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade and Transport in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT) and the negotiation of a new intergovernmental Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-Border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific, a UN treaty entered into force in February 2021.

Prior to joining the UN, he held faculty positions at the Asian Institute of Technology and Washington State University, USA.

Athita Komindr is Head of the UNCITRAL Regional Centre for Asia and the Pacific (UNCITRAL RCAP), managing technical assistance and capacity building programming available to over 50 States in Asia and the Pacific in key areas of commercial law, including dispute resolution, MSMEs, international contract practices, sale of goods, electronic commerce, transport, insolvency, international payments, secured transactions, and procurement. In that capacity, she coordinates with Governments and international and regional organizations with respect to trade law reform activities aimed at achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

Athita has twenty years of experience in the fields of international trade and economic law, arbitration, multilateral dispute resolution, and the rule of law and development. Prior to joining the United Nations, Athita mainly advised and worked with numerous Thai agencies, including the Thailand Institute of Justice, the Thai Ministry of Science and Technology, and the Thailand Arbitration Center where she managed the Arbitration and Legal Affairs Divisions. She also worked for the Thai Ministry of Commerce in Bangkok (2002-2005) and Geneva (2005-2010), representing Thailand in bilateral, regional, and multilateral trade negotiations, WTO dispute settlement, and treaty drafting.

Admitted to the New York Bar, Athita has experience in both common and civil law traditions in the public and private sectors, and holds degrees from Harvard College, Georgetown University Law Center, and Harvard Law School.

Email: [email protected] 

UNCITRAL RCAP
3rd Floor, 175 Art Center-daero, Yeonsu-gu, Incheon, Republic of Korea 22004

In 2021, Hannah Nguyen joined the Digital Standards Initiative - a collaborative cross-industry effort to advance the digitization of trade globally. Her focus is on engaging industry participants, standards developing organizations, solution providers, governments and intergovernmental organizations to harmonize public and private sector’s standardization efforts across the ecosystem.

In her previous role at one of the world's largest commodity logistics service providers, she led business development efforts for C. Steinweg Group in Asia Pacific for 9 years, resulting in key expansion projects in Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. Earlier in her career, Hannah provided market intelligence and advisory work to corporates interested in actionable advice on how to compete and grow in Asia. She also spent 2 years at Enterprise Singapore, working closely with global traders, brokers, exchanges, financial institutions and other intermediaries to drive the growth of the commodities and derivatives sector in Singapore.

Mr. Kijin Kim is Economist in the Economic Research and Regional Cooperation Department, Asian Development Bank. Since he joined the ADB in 2017, he has been working on trade, trade facilitation, and trade finance within the context of regional cooperation and integration (RCI). He contributed to ADB’s publications on these areas including the Asian Economic Integration Report, Trade Finance Gaps, Growth, and Jobs Survey, and Asia-Pacific Trade Facilitation Report.

Before joining the ADB, he was a research fellow of the Regional Economics Applications Laboratory at the University of Illinois since 2012. From 2004 to 2010, he worked as Economist at the Bank of Korea. He earned his PhD in economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2016, focusing on research within the fields of regional economics and applied econometrics, centered on the role of labor markets, the effects of heterogeneity in consumption spending and labor market participation on regional economies.

Raoul represents global business at the United Nations General Assembly, working in the Office of the Permanent Observer to the United Nations of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC).

Raoul led the ICC delegation to the Global Pact for the Environment negotiations at UNEP in Nairobi, Kenya, and spoke about the global business role at seminars in Nairobi, Ottawa and New York City.

He also leads the ICC working group on e-commerce, providing business perspectives for the Joint Statement Initiative on the trade-related aspects of electronic commerce at the World Trade Organization.

Raoul develops guidance and briefs on a wide range of international public policy issues, including the economic and fiscal response to COVID-19, the equitable distribution of vaccines, and digital trade.

Before joining ICC, Raoul was part of the litigation practice of a leading Australian law firm, and was seconded as a lawyer to the Australian Anti-Dumping Commission.

Don (“DongWhan”) LEE, has hands-on experience and extensive knowledge of international trade business through his career with Hanwha Corp. from 1994 to 2000. Work experience as the Director for Silicon Valley office, California of a Korean High-tech Start-up for 2 years from 2000 to 2002 provided practical knowledge and experience on cutting-edge ICT for Don’s career.

Since his start to work for KTNET as a Project Manager for building up Global paperless trade service network project to enable cross border transaction of electronic documents between Korea and EU member countries by interoperability of each countries’ paperless trade hubs in 2002, Don LEE lead the formation of “ASEAL(Asia-Europe Alliance for paperless trade)”, Private-Public Partnership Dialogue, as an founding member and developed business alliances with nation-wide paperless trade hubs to realize seamless paperless trade.

For the readiness of Global paperless trade infrastructure, Don LEE has initiated business opportunities and lead consultancy and system implementation projects under the framework of ODA and trade facilitation program of Korean Government, MDB’s,  and other Institutes. New Customs System for Mongolian Customs, Implementation of Libyan Trade Network system for foreign trade financed by Libyan Government, Implementing Modules of Peruvian VUCE(Foreign Trade Single Window system) 2.0, Modernization of Kenyan Customs Administration, Tanzanian e-Customs project, and Uzbekistan National Paperless Trade Platform Implementations are the cases.

With the bachelor’s degree of Economics at Korea University, Seoul, Don LEE got his MBA degree at Korea University 2006, and has completed course work for Ph. D of international trade at Dankook University(Ph. D Candidate), Korea to do study and research for how to share Korea’s knowledge and experience on e-government and paperless trade with developing countries in order to contribute to their sustainable growth.

Ms. Soo Hyun Kim is Economic Affairs Officer, Trade Policy and Facilitation Section, Trade, Investment and Innovation Division, United Nations ESCAP. She is currently managing capacity building projects on cross-border paperless trade and trade facilitation in the age of pandemics; and supporting the implementation of the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific. Previously she worked in the Investment and Enterprise Development Section with research focus on foreign direct investment (FDI) and investment regimes and their impact on sustainable development. She also worked to promote public-private sector dialogue by organizing the Asia-Pacific Business Forum (APBF) and supporting the ESCAP Sustainable Business Network (ESBN). Prior to this, she worked at the United Nations Secretariat in New York; local government (United Kingdom); and higher education institution (United Kingdom). She holds master’s degrees in business administration (specialisation in financial management) from TiasNimbas Business School (Netherlands) and library and information science from Loughborough University (United Kingdom). 

Ankur Huria is a Senior Trade and Regional Integration Specialist in the Trade and Regional Integration department of the World Bank Group. At the World Bank, he has 14+ years of experience in developing and contributing to the trade and integration agenda in over 40 countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe.    

His work has focused on trade logistics and corridors, trade facilitation and border management, regional integration, digital trade, standards for trade, national quality infrastructure, agribusiness supply chains, investment climate issues, value chains, and private sector development.

Huria holds master’s degrees in public policy (MPP) and Business Administration (MBA) with previous industry experience in consumer goods and consulting in the private and nonprofit sectors in logistics and supply chain and financial business advisory.

Ren Yuh KAY is an officer with the TradeTrust team at the Infocomm Media Development Authority who is at the forefront of social and economic digitalisation orchestration in collaboration with other Singapore government agencies. He currently manages the TradeTrust engagements with other Governments as well as International Organisations including those active in standards development.  Ren Yuh has more than 23 years of professional experience in digital initiatives and projects in the domains of Logistics, Maritime Transport and Trade Facilitation.  This includes extensive experience in the private sector, undertaking various leadership roles overseeing business development and project implementation portfolios spanning global markets.

Luca Castellani is a legal officer in the Secretariat of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL).

As secretary of UNCITRAL Working Group IV (Electronic Commerce), he oversaw the preparation of the UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Transferable Records as well as work on the use and cross-border recognition of identity management and trust services. He has assisted several countries in the enactment of UNCITRAL texts on electronic commerce. He is also active in the field of paperless trade facilitation and has contributed to drafting the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific.