ESPO roadmap to cut red tape

For European port authorities, accomplishing the internal market for maritime transport is a top priority. To realise this, the main focus should lay on simplifying the administrative burden and on removing customs obstacles to EU goods transported between EU ports.

Opening the ESPO Conference, ESPO chairman Santiago Garcia-Mila said: “We believe that it is time to go beyond the “yes/no” discussion on a European Maritime Single Window, whatever it might mean.”

“We believe that developing an ambitious but realistic roadmap, taking into account the realities of shipping and the existing EU and national legal requirements, will give the European ports and shipping industry a real window of opportunity,” he added.

ESPO believes that the recently launched Regulatory Fitness and Performance programme (REFIT) evaluation of both the Reporting Formalities Directive (RFD) and the Vessel Traffic Management Information System (VTMIS) directives should be seen as the perfect opportunity to analyse the reasons why the RFD is not properly implemented and therefore does not achieve its aims.

Furthermore, ESPO identifies the following steps on the road to simplifying and streamlining reporting:

• A network of interconnected reporting systems sharing the same functional specifications would be the best solution at European level.
• Ships calling at EU ports should report the same data elements in each EU port in the same format and only when justified by local circumstances, additional data.
• A call to the commission to set up an industry expert working group to contribute achieving the above exercises.