DUSHANBE, December 12, 2011, Asia-Plus -- The CIS Interstate Council for Standardization, Metrology and Certification decided to include in its standards-development program for 2012 some major e-standards and recommendations drawn up by UNECE and its Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT), at its 40th session in Baku, the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) information unit reports.

“This decision opens a new page in UNECE-CIS cooperation on information technologies and standards,” said Mr. Grigorii Elkin, head of the Russian Federal Agency on Technical Regulating and Metrology (ROSSTANDART), the agency that put forward the proposal.

The decision constitutes an important breakthrough in the use and promotion of UNECE standards in the CIS region. This was the first time that CIS countries discussed implementing UNECE-UN/CEFACT information standards and the following eight countries were represented at the event—Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Russian Federation, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine and Poland.

The growing globalization of the international economy and trade is creating new challenges for the integration of companies from transition economies into global supply chains.  Along with the traditional market factors, today''s challenges for companies include the ability to use information technologies and standards to ensure control over their products, cost effectiveness and on-time delivery.

The standards suggested for transposition and implementation include UN/EDIFACT— the world’s most widely used standard for electronic data exchange. It has also been adopted as ISO standard 9735.  Another is the UNECE standard for a uniform format and the harmonization of paper documents—the UN Layout Key (also adopted as ISO standard ISO 6422).

UNECE continues to work actively with the countries in transition to build awareness and capacity in the area of electronic standards and trade facilitation.  Cooperation with these countries will be further pursued within a new UNECE project to help developing and transition economies link to global supply chains by reducing obstacles to trade.  This project begins with a Global Trade Facilitation Conference, organized by UNECE, on December 12-13, 2011 in Geneva.