A report published this week by SITPRO, the UK’s trade facilitation body, reveals how complex the current UK security landscape within international trade has become. The report, A UK Review of Security Initiatives in International Trade, identifies at least 37 security themed procedures and controls impacting upon international traders in the UK and highlights the many levels of counterproductive and wasteful overlap that exist.
SITPRO's Chief Executive, Malcolm McKinnon, said, "Over the last few years, we have seen an avalanche of such initiatives presented by governments nationally, regionally and internationally, and new requirements are being introduced all the time."
He expressed concerns about the impact of security legislation upon the business community. "This creates uncertainty for traders that have to comply with them, together with a compliance cost in the form of changes to their own control and data management systems to meet them - costs which ultimately get passed onto the consumer."
SITPRO believes that security objectives can be improved through the simplification, harmonisation, standardisation and modernisation of trade procedures. The report calls upon traders, governments and other international bodies to work together with SITPRO to:
- Eliminate the wasteful overlaps between similar initiatives
- Reduce the costs and complexity associated with compliance
- Identify and develop the potential benefits for traders
- Turn this collection of separate initiatives into a single vision of a secure supply chain.
The full report is available now from SITPRO's website at http://www.sitpro.org.uk/policy/security/initiatives0108.pdf (pdf 820KB 
)..
Notes for Editors
SITPRO, the UK's Trade Facilitation Agency, was established in 1970 to simplify international trade and much of its work has focussed upon improving the procedures at ports and borders, looking at issues such as improving the arrangements for inspecting goods at the border and streamlining the submission of data to government. Since the attack on the World Trade Centre in 2001 highlighted the need for greater vigilance, SITPRO has also been campaigning for the application of trade facilitation principles to security controls that will enhance security without impeding trade.
SITPRO is a non-departmental public body funded by the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform and undertakes policy work at national, European and international levels. For further information, visit SITPRO's website at http://www.sitpro.org.uk/.
SITPRO News Release - 8 February 2008
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