Electronic Consignment Security Declaration (e-CSD) to be adopted in Switzerland

13/01/2014

Zurich, Switzerland: Swiss WorldCargo will soon be transmitting live “Electronic Consignment Security Declarations” (e-CSDs) for its electronic air waybill shipments that were tested in cooperation with its business partners Kuehne + Nagel and Cargologic. The adoption of e-CSD in Switzerland marks a significant milestone for the achievement of a more secure and “paperless” supply chain worldwide.

For the last two years, The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has been working extensively with carriers, regulators, freight forwarders, ground handling agents and other key stakeholders worldwide to develop standards and processes for e-CSD data capture.

In Switzerland, the air cargo division of SWISS, with the leading logistics provider Kuehne + Nagel and ground handling agent Cargologic were actively involved in the preparatory e-CSD testing earlier last year in close collaboration with IG Air Cargo (the Interest Group Air Cargo Switzerland). 
 
The adoption of the new e-CSD facility in Switzerland follows the recent approval of the corresponding e-CSD standards by the Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA), Switzerland’s aviation authority:  IATA and its partners have in fact satisfied the FOCA that there are no obstacles to the electronic transmission of highly sensitive data. The e-CSD approach is paving the way for a more secure and efficient transport of air cargo by providing the security status of a shipment in electronic format:  The new electronic declaration highlights “who” has secured each consignment as well as “how” and “when” it was secured. With its standardization of both the process and the documentation of such evidence, e-CSD will replace redundant security declarations in various formats, and will simplify validity checks to ease the operational work.   

“The e-CSD is a key facilitator for securing the whole supply chain,” comments Des Vertannes, Global Head of Cargo at IATA. “By establishing that cargo and mail consignments have been correctly secured upstream of the airport and through transit points, bottlenecks and delays will be reduced,” he continues. “Thanks to the work of the IG Air Cargo in Switzerland, the FOCA have joined other key regulators in endorsing the e-CSD, which we hope will pave the way for other significant endorsements in the months to come.” 

Swiss WorldCargo and IG Air Cargo will now be presenting the benefits of the new e-CSD standards to the main air cargo stakeholders in Switzerland. This will be done in January 2014 in the form of three separate introduction sessions in Zurich, Basel and Geneva. Further information on these will be found at  www.ig-aircargo.ch