The future of trade digitisation

With India aiming to become a $5-trillion economy, digitising trade to create a more efficient and cost-effective system will be crucial

The pandemic presented the international trade community with an unprecedented and volatile situation in which conditions changed daily. The health crisis magnified the friction and inefficiencies caused by the paper-based nature of trade. In many countries, the basic delivery of physical documents was challenged by lockdowns, giving rise to delays, uncertainty, and further costs.

From reduced shipping capacity reacting to the initial shocks in demand to increasing staffing pressures arising from quarantine and social distancing measures, all these further complicated matters. By late April 2020, documentary trade finance substantially declined by as much as 49 per cent on a weekly basis,