GSBN: Driving eBL adoption across the industry is top priority

Bertrand Chen emphasizes that decarbonization and the green transition are inevitable trends in response to climate change. He highlights that true decarbonization can only be achieved with increased regulatory clarity, data transparency, and accessibility. GSBN is committed to driving the adoption of eBLs and supporting decarbonization efforts.

SAFETY4SEA: How does GSBN aim to redefine global trade, and what role does technology, particularly blockchain, play in achieving these goals?

Bertrand Chen: Despite investments into digital transformation across the shipping industry, major bottlenecks remain. Due to the complex nature of global trade, there are disparate and often competing parties across supply chains. The result is an inherent lack of trust or incentive to share accurate and timely data, as well as the existence of multiple data siloes. Therefore, achieving pan-industry efficiency and collaboration is difficult. GSBN’s neutral, blockchain-enabled infrastructure enables trusted shipping data to be securely shared across global supply chains. Since data can be trusted by disparate parties, it encourages greater industry collaboration even among competitors.  One such example is the Bill of Lading, a legally binding paper document that constitutes a contract of carriage and is required for the insurance of goods. Today, 99% of Bill of Lading documents are still paper-based, with 45 million of such documents couriered around the world to ensure shipments can keep moving. An electronic Bill of Lading, eBL, issued over GSBN can harness the immutable nature of blockchain to preserve the advantages offered by physical paper, as well as the trust-by-design of the technology.

S4S: What are the top priorities in your agenda for the next five years?

B.Ch.: Driving eBL adoption across the industry is our top priority. In 2023, the industry achieved several milestones in this journey, such as the FIT Alliance committing to fully transition to eBLs by 2030. eBL is the first but very important step towards digitalising the shipping industry. It is not just about replacing a paper document with a digital representation, but how data can be directly embedded in reimagined digital workflows to improve operating efficiency, foster collaboration and be harnessed to generate new value for different stakeholders across the supply chain.  Separately, supporting the industry’s decarbonisation and sustainability journey is a strategic priority for GSBN over the next five years. We believe that the trusted exchange of verified data will play an important role in justifying the investments made through this green transition as well as combat greenwashing claims. As the industry steps up with multiple initiatives and targets, GSBN is working closely with industry partners and bodies such as GCMD and DNV to support these decarbonisation efforts.

S4S: What challenges is the maritime industry encountering in its journey to digitalization from your perspective?

B.Ch.: The complex nature of supply chains means many, often competing parties, must collaborate with each other. There is no incentive within the industry for participants to share accurate, timely and relevant data since operational data is commercially sensitive. The result is a vast landscape of data siloes with little alignment, impacting collaboration and efficiency of processes. This also impacts the industry’s transition towards decarbonisation. Measuring the value and impact of decarbonisation investments such as alternative fuels or energy efficiency technologies, requires access to data. Yet fuel producers and bunkering agents are reluctant to share data transparently. Even shipping lines in alliances are unwilling to share operational data between themselves. Piecing together the data necessary to measure the impact of green investments is something of a minefield. If end customers cannot access trusted and granular data from their service providers who are charging them a green premium, it is hard to imagine that we will see widespread adoption of green shipping products.

S4S: Are there specific use cases or success stories that you would like to share to highlight your platform’s impact on operational efficiency?

B.Ch.: In May 2023, GSBN completed a successful pilot with COSCO Shipping Specialized Carriers, linking eBL to the cargo release process seamlessly at Qingdao Port International Ltd.  Traditionally, COSCO Shipping Specialized Carriers or their shipping agents had to provide a copy of the Bill of Lading to Qingdao Port’s system as a supporting document for the cargo release process. This was the first time these two solutions on GSBN have been combined, resulting in substantially greater operational efficiency of the terminals by reducing the average time for cargo discharging from the vessel to leaving the terminal by over 24 hours. In another instance, New Land-sea Corridor Operation Co Ltd, (NLSC) and COSCO Shipping Lines deployed GSBN’s Cargo Release in the Port of Chongqing, a dry port along the trade corridor. This cooperation also helped reduce the release procedure from 1-2 days to less than 4 hours.

S4S: What benefits will the maritime organizations experience with the adoption of electronic Bills of Lading? What is your feedback from the market?

B.Ch.: We have received positive feedback from our members and the industry at large. Earlier in 2023, the FIT Alliance surveyed 289 industry stakeholders across 66 countries, and 86% of survey respondents identified increased speed, while 78% cited process efficiencies. Nearly nine in ten respondents (86%) said they believed eBLs can/will unlock wider trade digitalisation. It’s obvious that eBL can make international trade more efficient, reliable, secure and sustainable. As a result, it will reduce costs across the board while making global trade more accessible.  According to McKinsey, digitising the Bill of Lading, which accounts for up to 30% of trade documentation costs, could lead to cost savings for all stakeholders amounting to $6.5 billion a year, as well as unlock $50 billion in value for the ocean trade ecosystem.

S4S: How can industry stakeholders best use technology and data in support of sustainable development? How does GSBN encourage collaboration towards?

B.Ch.: We believe in supporting a portfolio of green solutions including alternative fuels, energy efficient technologies and enhanced digitalisation. GSBN provides a common data infrastructure where verified data can be shared, while working together with industry partners to support our members through every step of shipping’s decarbonisation journey. In July 2023, we signed a knowledge partnership agreement with the Global Centre for Maritime Decarbonisation (GCMD) with the aim of enabling the secured and scalable exchange of data pertaining to decarbonisation initiatives. GSBN also partnered with DNV, the leading classification society to promote alternative fuel adoption with trusted data for green claims verification. As the industry goes through major changes, trustworthy data at the shipment level is vital for the industry to participate in the decarbonisation journey. Without an infrastructure like GSBN, the industry risks creating even more data siloes that contain partial data at different level of granularity, making verifying the green impact of projects at scale impossible.

S4S: Do you believe the maritime industry is moving in the right direction? What do you see as the defining trends driving maritime toward the future?

B.Ch.: Decarbonisation and green transition are both inevitable trends in response to climate change. At the recent COP28, the Chief Executive Officers of leading global shipping lines including Maersk, CMA CGM Group, Hapag-Lloyd and MSC Mediterranean Shipping company issued a joint declaration for an end date for fossil-only powered newbuilds. There is also a united view on the concrete regulatory measures needed to create the investment conditions critical to accelerating the industry’s decarbonisation transition. In other words, while the shipping industry needs to achieve IMO’s 2030, 2040, and net-zero 2050 greenhouse gas (GHG) targets, there is the need to create a standardised data source for an effective GHG pricing mechanism. Whilst the maritime industry is heading in the right direction, true decarbonisation can only be achieved with more regulatory clarity, data transparency and accessibility.

S4S: Do you have any projects/ plans that you would like to share with industry stakeholders?

B.Ch.: Besides shifting from a paper Bill of Lading to an eBL, we are also proactively exploring the opportunity of tokenising electronic Bill of Lading (eBL) for global trade. Tokenisation is the game-changer reshaping the financial markets by creating new, financial assets.  In partnership with Ant Group Digital Technologies, we are exploring tokenising eBL to unlock an entire new asset class tied to trade flows. From there, we can create new opportunities to bridge the world’s trade finance gap and provide the building blocks for novel trade finance products.

S4S: If you could change one thing from your perspective what this one thing would it be and why?

B.Ch.: Like many traditional sectors, this industry has been hyped and disappointed by new technologies such as blockchain or artificial intelligence. If I could change one thing, I wish the industry would focus less on the technology itself and more on the unique new products and services that are possible today. Ultimately it is by solving real problems of end customers that we will see successful deployment of these new technologies. Technology alone is rarely the silver bullet to solve problems and solely focusing on it has confounded industry experts for decades.

S4S: What is your message to industry stakeholders with regards to a more efficient and secure trade?

B.Ch.: We are moving towards a more dynamic and volatile shipping industry where we cannot rely anymore on the traditional systems of yesteryear. To survive and thrive in this new world, the industry needs to share data, process it and act upon it quickly.  Given the complexity and interconnectedness of the shipping industry, there will not be a single solution that can fit the bill, but rather a portfolio of solutions built atop of a common data infrastructure. This will start with paperless trade in the form of eBL adoption, evolve into data sharing with proper consent mechanisms for trade finance and finally conclude with transparent, traceable and credible data for decarbonisation.

The views presented are only those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of SAFETY4SEA and are for information sharing and discussion purposes only.