Cloud computing opens up new avenues for port development, as Stevie Knight discovers
The limited uptake of Port Community Systems outside Europe, says Pascal Ollivier, SOGET director of Corporate Development and EPCSA chairman, is down to ports “getting the paradigm wrong” and seeing these systems simply as an IT project.
He explains what was needed was something that helped build the ‘community’ aspect part of a PCS. “There are all these ports, worldwide, that have bought software, and bought applications, but they are not used,” he says.
“Why? It’s because they have been put in as a way of conveying data only, not as a way of helping develop and manage the changes that people need in order to reach up and down the supply chain.” He goes on to say: “A community is a community, you have to manage the change to get it to grow. IT itself can’t manage anything, can’t drive anything: when ports realised this they realised they were on the wrong paradigm. A PCS is not an IT system.”
The cloud has answered this by effectively taking most of the IT out of the equation and enabling ports with limited systems in place to both share non-sensitive data and catch up with the technology curve – without a lot of investment and with the promise of more from the cloud’s seemingly unlimited overhead cupboard if they need it. This is where the emerging economies can gain a real advantage: the ease of getting into the storage cupboard also gives them easy access to plug and play systems and helps them catch up with those mature economies which have built-in legacy systems.
Losing legacy
It’s no coincidence then that one very big roll out is in Indonesia, starting with Jakarta. Firstly, its previous system was very limited, so there was not too much to get out of the way.
Secondly, Indonesia is the largest archipelago in the world with 17,508 islands and over a hundred commercial ports. The area is growing rapidly from its ‘emerging economy’ base and has a solid middle class with all the aspirations that implies, but efficiency is no easy task considering the geography. The charismatic RJ Lino, chief executive of the Indonesia Port Corporation has high hopes, saying the cloud PCS “will allow our ports to increase dramatically their level of activity while complying with international trade facilitation and security standards.”
But even for those with legacy systems, there’s a lot to be said for ‘one big overhead cupboard’. Ken Washington of Tampa points out that a fairly typical process means tying together the departments that variously deal with a ship’s arrival, docking reservations, collections of dock, wharf and utility fees, the harbour master fees and the vessel’s manifest.
Mr Washington admits Tampa’s previous system was tedious and inefficient: it had “limited to nonexistent interfaces” with the accounting system so information had to be entered twice, and the separate pools of information meant data use was constrained to the originating department.
Comfort factor
However, it’s hard to get people to abandon a system so a lot hangs on the comfort factor. “Prior to the implementation, the organisation spent a lot time identifying tasks and processes that would remain the same but have a different look and feel,” says Mr Washington, and during training a point was made of letting the users compare what they were currently doing to what was about to take its place.
Despite the obvious fears, dealing with legacy systems isn’t that big a deal, says Ludo De Bock, Microsoft’s senior director for EU & NATO International Organisations. According to him it’s possible to simply morph many older data formats to the cloud, and once in place up there, additional data can be sucked up from users to populate the new system.
Mr De Bock adds that despite recent concerns about data security, “you can both have your cake and eat it”: after all, most governmental systems like Customs do want to know that their data is ‘kept’ within national boundaries.
“The system’s flexibility means you can have a ‘private umbrella’ as well a public cloud so you can keep data in your own, managed location or sitting above you with a host or a combination of the two, holding sensitive data locally but putting shared systems and data out there in order to interact with others,” he explains. However, he is decidedly of the opinion that data is “best migrated to the cloud” unless there are compelling reasons not to.
Up to speed
Microsoft is interested in borders and Customs systems for two reasons. Firstly, the company itself is a big exporter and has reasons for keeping tabs on the developments; secondly, having a deep understanding of customs challenges through its close collaboration with the World Customs Organisation (WCO), it’s very interested in rolling out solutions for governments and sees that universality is key. Mr De Bock points out that the South African Trade Hub Trans Kalahari Corridor (Namibia and Tanzania) has gone ahead in piloting standardised processes around cloud based connectivity. “Pretty much the whole technology came out of the box with only customisation for the connectivity to the existing Asycuda customs declaration system,” says Mr De Bock.
He adds: “That’s the major driver, get out of the box as much as you can and then replicate it. This will have a lifecycle impact and speed up transactions, and most importantly, when the rules change, the cloud base means it can respond quickly.”
While a ‘single window’ is being pushed through upcoming EC legislation, at the moment it’s only the ports that are expected to comply. So, what happens if it is so successful the government wants to latch other import-export functions on to it?
It seems that the small country of Congo Brazzaville may prove the point. The whole single window initiative started with the port but it got so much interest that government departments like Customs decided they should own it. After a lot of discussion the authorities chose to collaborate on a ‘country wide’ single window. “Still, it’s not been done overnight, it’s taken two and a half years,” points out Mr De Bock.
As for the future, Mr de Bock says a worldwide Customs window is on the way, “but what it needs is two or three countries to step up and say ‘do the experiment.’ However he admits if it’s only an inter-governmental exercise it doesn’t make sense: “It has to tie in the private sector; it’s the biggest part of the chain and is the area that stands to win or lose most.”
