Policy paper

UK G7 Presidency: Roadmap to reform for electronic transferable records

This roadmap lays out the practical steps to reform to encourage greater adoption and use of electronic transferable records. It has been published under the UK’s G7 Presidency.

This was published under the 2019 to 2022 Johnson Conservative government

Documents

Details

Transferable records, such as bills of lading, are the most important commercial documents in trade and trade finance. Currently, less than 1% of bills of lading are in electronic form. This is a huge missed opportunity, given that electronic transferable records will make it easier, cheaper, faster and greener for companies to trade. It will bring global trade law into the 21st century by enabling businesses across the globe to move from paper-based to digital-based transactions when buying and selling internationally.

In April 2021, the G7 + digital and technology trade ministers agreed to collaborate on electronic transferable records. As G7 President, the UK has been leading this work, looking at the legal and regulatory barriers. As a result of technical discussions with the G7, together with Australia and the Republic of Korea, the UK has published a roadmap to reform. The roadmap lays out the practical steps to reform, to lead to greater adoption of eTR across the G7 and beyond.

Updates to this page

Published 17 December 2021

Sign up for emails or print this page