Navigating the Future of Trade: Mastering Single Window Implementation in Maldives

Dr. Hong XUE, Law Professor of Beijing Normal University Law Professor, National E-Commerce Expert appointed by China Ministry of Commerce, Member of State Expert Committee on Trade Digitization. She was on the expert panel drafting the Chinese E-Commerce Law at the National People’s Congress. She is on the Advisory Committee of the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT). She is an experienced arbitrator at China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (CIETAC)  and China Maritime Arbitration Commission (CMAC).

Eva Chan was the Head of International Business in Dagang Net Technologies, Malaysia that managed Dagang Net’s international business such as overseas Single Window project for consultancy and implementation, B2b and G2G cross-border data exchange between Malaysia  and it’s counterparts and international connectivity for port systems.

She has vast experience in the Single Window and Customs implementation since 1993. She has worked as a domain expert in the trade and Customs area in close cooperation with international organisations and represented Malaysian Government as the technical consultant in ASEAN Single Window Technical Working Group. She has also worked in intrnational projects with focus on Single Window feasibility study such as Nigeria, Nepal, Hong Kong SAR and in the role as a WCO Data harmonization expert. She has also carried out data harmonization between Customs and OGAs for ASEAN Single Window, Swedish Customs and other countries.

She was appointed as Head of DFTZ Platform by Malaysia  Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) to implement the world first DFTZ Platform that enabled the connection of eMarketplaces such as Alibaba to Malaysia Customs and Other Government Agencies in 2017.

She has also worked closely with international organisations such as UN/CEFACT, UNESCAP, APEC Model for ePort Network (APMEN), Pan-Asian eCommerce Alliance (PAA), IPCSA, and ASEAN Single Window focusing on digitalization of trade and logistics initiatives.

Elisabetta Gentile is Senior Economist at the South Asia Department of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). She is Maldives Country Team Leader and project officer for the SASEC Maldives National Single Window project. Her work currently focuses on trade and global value chain participation. She edited and co-authored the Global Value Chain Development Report 2021 and currently working on the 2023 edition. Elisabetta was previously a lecturer in the Department of Economics at the National University of Singapore, where she taught international economics. Elisabetta has a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Houston.

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.

Sung Heun has over 20 years of experience in the trade facilitation industry. Through his career, he has worked on many projects across the Asia Pacific, Africa and South America. He is currently the Director of International Business and Cooperation, Korea Trade Network (KTNET). In KTNET, he oversees the planning and development of cross-border paperless trade services and implementation of Single Window and other e-Government system projects in overseas by Korea’s national paperless trade platform development experience. In this capacity, he has initiated several cross-border public and private partnership programs for cross-border paperless trade among Asian countries, including Pan Asian e-Commerce Alliance (PAA) and world-first cross-border electronic certificate of an origin exchange project between Republic of Korea and Taiwan province of China. Currently, he is an advisor to UN Network of Experts of Trade and Transportation and a chairperson of the technical workgroup of the PAA, managing the technical framework of cross-border paperless trade service of PAA. His previous experience with the Trade and Investment division in the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific lends a strategic edge to Sung Heun to make strategic decisions related to paperless trade and trade facilitation.

Professor David Widdowson is Chief Executive Officer of the Centre for Customs and Excise Studies at Charles Sturt University, Australia.  He is the founder and president of the International Network of Customs Universities, founder and Editor-in-Chief of the World Customs Journal, a member of the World Customs Organization’s Partnership in Customs Academic Research & Development, a member of the Scientific Board for the World Customs Organization and a founding director of the Trusted Trade Alliance.

David holds a PhD in Public Sector Management and has over 40 years’ experience in international trade regulation, including 21 years with the Australian Customs Service. In 2019 he was appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia for significant service to higher education in the field of international trade and customs. His research areas include Trade Facilitation, Regulatory Compliance Management, Risk Management and Supply Chain Security.

• In 2004, Bachelor degree of science in Applied Computer Science-Multimedia
• In 2006, Master degree of science in Information Science, Information Technology
• 2004-2008, Web application developer, National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA), Ministry of Science and Technology. Develop the Geographic Information System for the government agencies
• 2008-2019, Computer technical officer, ICT bureau. Take part in the development of National Single Window and ASEAN Single Window
• 2019 - present, Chief of international cooperation unit. Implement and Integrate Thai's government agencies' systems with ASEAN Single Window and other cross-border data exchange

Jonathan is Managing Director of Trade Facilitation Pte Ltd (TFPL), a consultancy firm with specialty in trade facilitation, trade policy, single window, and customs reform and modernisation programmes. TFPL comprises trade experts and associates to offer exceptional expertise to support the international trade community.

Jonathan had hands-on experience in over 40 customs / trade facilitation programmes globally, He was also involved in over 20 Single Windows / Customs digitalisation projects, several regional connectivity projects, as an expert resource for the ASEAN Single Window, as well as the Pacific Alliance regional connectivity connecting four Latin American countries. He served as the Project Director for the many customs / trade facilitation implementation projects including Kenya, Qatar and Oman. He was key consultant to the Government of Hong Kong SAR for their new Trade Single Window. He helped developed the National Trade Facilitation Strategy and Roadmap for Government of Greece. He served as an expert resource for ASEAN Economic Community and helped developed the ASEAN’s Seamless Trade Facilitation Indicators.

Jonathan had also served as an expert resource to various international organisations in trade facilitation and policy issues. He recently served a visiting scholar with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). He co-authored the chapter “Customs Administrations and Digitalization” in the new IMF reference book - "Customs Matters: Strengthening Customs Administration in a Changing World", released in June 2022.

Jonathan had completed projects with the Asian Development Bank on customs’ capacity for cross border e-commerce. He served as a member of the international Advisory committee for the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific (UNNeXT). He also an invited member of Alibaba Standardisation thinktank group. He has authored several papers including the often-cited paper - Ten Years of Single Window Implementation: Lessons Learned (United Nations, 2011), as well as many others published by United Nations, Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia and others.

Fachry is a leading expert of National Single Window (NSW) in Indonesia with a Master's of Information System Management focused in Information System Management from Carnegie Mellon University - Heinz School, United States of America.

He is an experienced System Architect skilled in National Single Window (Design, Development and Implementation), Electronic Data Exchange, Messaging Gateway, Distributed System and public policy industry, who have been successfully integrating the System of INSW with more than 20 Government Agencies, 10 Terminal Operators, and 26 Shipping Lines in Indonesia.

Fachry has been regularly appointed as the leader of several both national and international workshops, so as to provide business counsel and technical assistance to Governance Agencies for National Single Window implementation and e-Government matters.

His strong system design experiences and project management professional have been proven through demonstrated history of delivering a number of national and international breakthrough projects such as:

• Maritime Single Window implementation through Single Submission (SSm) platform of Seaport Carriers.
• Application Protocol Interface (API) Catalogue to facilitate multichannel service integration between INSW System and multiplatform systems of Government Agencies, Traders and 3rd Party Private Platforms
• National Logistic Ecosystem (NLE) Platform to Ease of Doing Business in Indonesia
• Online Single Submission (OSS)
• Indonesia Single Registration which is based on Business Identity Number
• Indonesia Single Risk Management (ISRM) which is based on Single Stakeholder Information and Single Stakeholder Risk Profile
• Single Submission (SSm) platform of Import/Export for Customs Declaration with Quarantine (Joint Inspection), Permits/Licenses, and Automated Quota Monitoring.
• INSW Gateway for intergovernmental electronic data exchange (i.e Electronic Certificate of Origin Data Exchange (EODES) between Indonesia – Korea, Indonesia – China, Indonesia – Australia, and ASEAN Customs Declaration Document between Indonesia – Singapore).

Bryan is a partner in the firm’s Entertainment & Media Group. Bryan has over 20 years’ experience focusing on transactional, regulatory and legislative work across the ASEAN and Asia-Pacific countries. Bryan also has extensive experience advising on venture capital investments into fast-growing technology companies, crypto currency projects including funds, exchanges and international consortiums, as well as cyber security, data protection and trade facilitation matters. Bryan has also written a number of major legal texts in the area on e-transactions, data protection and electronic evidence. Bryan served as legal advisor on ASEAN Single Window and also on United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT).

A contributor of the UNESCAP Guidebook on SW. A contributor to UNECE and UN/CEFACT work.

• Principal Advisor, Institute for IT Innovation, Kasetsart University
• Advisory Committee Member, United Nations Network of Experts on Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT)
• Principal Advisor, Thailand National Single Window Policy and Oversight Committee

He has assisted many ministries in Thailand on digital strategies, National Single Window for trade facilitation, business process reengineering, interoperability and standardization.  

He has been actively contributing to UNNExT since 2007 and contributed to many UNNExT publications. Meanwhile, he provides strategic advising, training and technical supports to more than 20 countries in the Asia, Pacific and Africa regions. He was also a project lead for the work that became the UN/CEFACT Recommendation No.42 - Establishment of a Trade and Transport Facilitation Monitoring Mechanism (2017). 

Dr. Keretho received his Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA. 

Mr. Christian Lembke, as a Technical Attaché under the WCO Compliance and Facilitation Directorate since June 2020, is mainly involved in the area of the WCO Data Model, the online platform RAM-MAP SWIM, Advance Passenger Information as well as the Globally Networked Customs concept.

He has previously worked as a customs officer at Frankfurt am Main Airport (Germany) in the field of risk assessment for air cargo shipments since 2005. He has been involved in a risk assessment project in an EU working group at the international level.

Mr. Sangwon Lim is a special advisor of the United Nations Network of Experts for Paperless Trade and Transport in Asia and the Pacific (UNNExT) During his 12 years of work in United Nations ESCAP, he specialized in trade facilitation and integration. In ESCAP, his area of expertise included implementing paperless trade and Single Window. He has led development of several technical guides and provided numerous advisory services and technical assistance in this area to several developing countries in the region, including Single Window implementation. Before joining ESCAP in 2009, he had served the National IT Industry Promotion Agency (NIPA) of the Republic of Korea for more than 9 years, specializing in application of ICT in various public and private sector business domains, including international trade, Customs and value-added tax system. He had actively participated and contributed to international development of trade facilitation and e-business through regional and international fora, including Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), ebXML initiative, and United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT).  He was the Rapporteur for the Asia and the Pacific in the UN/CEFACT from 2003 to 2009. He holds a Ph.D in logistics management from Chulalongkorn University, Thailand. He is currently working as a Development Coordination Officer/Economist, Office of the Resident Coordinator of United Nations Mongolia. 

Mr. Tengfei Wang joined the United Nations ESCAP as an Economic Affairs Officer in 2008. Since then, he has been working on the areas related to trade and transport facilitation, digital economy, technology and innovation. Currently, his work is mainly focused on implementing the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-border Paperless Trade in Asia and the Pacific, providing advice to governments and undertaking studies on topics pertinent to trade facilitation, paperless trade and digital economy. In his career, he drafted many UN legislative documents, guidebooks and reports. Furthermore, he publishes extensively in peer-review academic journals on trade, logistics and digital economy. His publications have been cited over 4,000 times. He earned his PhD from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and was the winner of 'Palgrave Macmillan' global PhD thesis competition (2002-2005).

Dr. Hemali Shah, holds a PhD from Monash University, Australia. Her thesis provided measures and recommendations to model the Australian laws based on the investigation of legal conditions required to facilitate cross-border single window operability. For the regulatory matters related to Single Window and Paperless Trade, Hemali has gained over 10 years of experience.

Hemali has worked with international organizations such as the UNESCAP and the UN/CEFACT as a legal expert in the area of Single Window and Paperless Trade. She was a part of the UNESCAP Legal Working Group, which developed ‘Legal Readiness Assessment Guide on Cross-Border Paperless Trade’. Hemali also co-authored the UN/CEFACT Recommendation No. 36 on the Cross-Border Single Window Interoperability, which was developed within the International Trade Procedures Domain (‘ITPD’) in 2016.

Hemali’s recent research work focuses on the international supply chain sustainability issues. She is currently working on the research project that investigates regulatory aspects of private eco-labeling and establishing its nexus with global trade.