Indonesian Customs adopt blockchain technology to reduce shipping cost

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The Customs and Excise Directorate General of Indonesia announced the adoption of blockchain technology for information sharing, in an effort to reduce shipping costs and eliminate inefficiency resulting from paper-based processes.

Indonesia Customs become the 11th governmental entity to join TradeLens, a blockchain based shipping consortium of supply chain actors connected through a global trade platform jointly developed in August 2018 by IBM and Maersk and that aims at simplifying shipping operations and goods discharge procedures in seaports, in view to improve cargo clearance. Customs plan to use Tradelens as part of a system called CEISA 4.0 (Customs Excise Information System and Automation) to connect importers, exporters, and logistics providers.

Other members of TradeLens’ group include the customs agencies of Azerbaijan, Canada, and Thailand. Jordan Customs also recently announced the launching of a pilot project for handling information exchanges between the different actors in the supply chain through the TradeLens system.

The TradeLens platform offers Application Program Interfaces (APIs) allowing supply chain data to be effectively tracked and recorded on an immutable (permanent) ledger, after being broadcasted using a private (permissioned) blockchain. The objective is to accelerate inspection processes while reducing the dependency on paper-based procedures.

At the beginning of February 2020, the US Federal Maritime Commission awarded an anti-trust exemption to five American members of the TradeLens consortium to share information about US supply chain events and collaborate on further developing the platform without the risk of antitrust exposure under the U.S. Shipping Act of 1984.