The deployment of electronic freight transport information (eFTI), is one of the pillars of the EU’s attempt to decarbonise the freight industry. The policy aims at digitalising freight transport documents, most of which are still currently circulating in a physical form.
RailFreight.com had a chat with Eva Killar, Head of Mobility Development and Investments Department at the Estonian Ministry of Climate, and Heiti Mering, founder of the Estonian Digital Logistics Centre of Excellence, to discuss the eFTI programme and have a clearer understanding of it.
The double interview will be published in two parts. The first one can be found here. In this second part, the discussion revolved around the role of Estonia and European institutions and the next steps after the adoption of the Implementing Act. Moreover, we delved into how paperless transport works outside of the EU
What are the next steps after the Implementing Act has been adopted?
We have already started the work with our Competent Authorities and eFTI Platform developers within the eFTI4EU Project. We will start this Spring with the Proof of Concept (PoC) of the eFTI Gate which is functioning according to the rules of the Implementing Act. Parallel work is done during the legal analyses of eFTI that we started in December 2023 intending to put in place the roadmap and timeline for a prompt implementation of eFTI into Estonian law.
Within the eFTI4EU Project, every participating country provides its own roadmap to the Competent Authorities on how to reach full eFTI implementation. The eFTI Gate strategy and common rule set will be created during the project and the full eFTI exchange environment will be tested.
There are about a dozen e-services in Estonia today that would potentially qualify as eFTI platforms in the future. As part of the eFTi Gate PoC, we will also connect their services so that the Police and Border Guard Board and other competent authorities can make control requests about the cargo through a single channel of all services. In this way, we will have the eFTI model implemented as a PoC in Estonia already in 2024. The first result on the national roadmaps on eFTI are to be expected at the beginning of autumn 2024.
What is the role of the Estonian government in the project?
The Estonian Ministry of Climate is the lead partner of the eFTI4EU Project. We are working on the green transition focusing on climate goals and climate adaptation, where mobility and transport play a big part. As digitisation has an important role in reaching these goals, it is important for us to move ahead with eFTI as quickly as possible. That is why we agreed to lead this very important project where we work together with other Member States and private sector partners to develop a well-harmonised and interoperable European-wide eFTI exchange environment.
What are the roles of EU institutions and national governments in supporting this initiative?
The project has 23 partners from 9 Member States: Austria, Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Lithuania and Portugal. Observers are Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and Inland Navigation Europe. From the public sector side, the project partners are from different Ministries responsible for implementing eFTI in their countries and, in some cases, governmental agencies providing IT services for their governments.
Thus, we have a wide range of expertise in our project, and we can learn from each other’s experiences as the level of digitalisation and the approach to how to deal with it varies among countries. The goal is to reach a common approach to move forward with eFTI architecture and test all aspects of the eFTI environment during the eFTI4U project.
Since the transport sector is very fragmented, their awareness of the possibilities of using digital transport documents as well as their willingness to invest are low, it is very important, in addition to the development of legislation, to create appropriate financial instruments to support faster development, involving both EU and state funds.
How does paperless rail freight transport work outside of Europe? Do other continents or countries have similar systems already in place?
There are countries and regions outside the European Union willing to organise transport similarly to the EU, such as the Western Balkans countries. There is another group of countries that are ready to consider it, but are independent in their decisions, including Central Asian countries. There are regions where freight transport is less regulated, like the USA and there are also regions that are still looking for suitable solutions but have recognised that today’s freight transport paper-based organisation is the biggest obstacle to the economy and a brake on many development plans.
However, there are also countries and regions where Single Window principles have long been implemented and multimodal freight transport is far more developed than in Europe. Singapore and other Asian countries are an example of this.
Another example is Estonia, whose railway network is connected with the Russian and the Latvian ones. In both cases, the exchange of trains and wagons has been done for years via digital, paperless documents. Estonia has also followed ASEAN Single Window model and is also supported by the UN/CEFACT Single Window initiative, which was renewed in 2023. Having said that, we must stress that because of the Russian aggression in Ukraine, all the railway operations between Estonia and Russia have stopped.
The Estonian Single Window model envisages the exchange of data on all modes of transport because several modes of transport are often used when transporting goods, and today there is no link between different transport documents. Thus, documents are printed out in one system and then manually entered into another system at the destination. In addition, competent authorities usually do not have access to transport documents, which is why paper documents are required. However, enabling public sector access is neither an obligation nor an interest of private companies’ investment.
Estonia has presented this concept to the European Commission in 2018 and it has also been taken into account when developing the eFTI Regulation. Our architectural vision has gone through all DTLF and other support groups and has been evaluated both from a technology and process point of view. We have several experiences with previous eCMR projects and Estonia is well-known for being a top performer in the digitalisation of its administration.
The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of eFTI4EU project and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Union.
