At its 40th session (April 4th to 9th, 2016), the International Maritime Organization Facilitation Committee (FAL) adopted an amendment to the FAL Convention that would require public authorities to establish, within three years after adoption, a system for the electronic exchange of the pre-arrival and departure information called for in the Convention.
The amendments also requires that public authorities provide at least 12 months for shipowners and other parties to transition to electronic submission of information when the system is made mandatory by the public authority. The amendment is estimated to become effective in 2018.
This decision follows seven years of discussions within the FAL Committee to conduct a comprehensive revision of the Convention with a view to ensuring that it adequately addresses the present and emerging needs of the shipping industry, taking into account transmission of information and data by electronic means and the single window.
The amendment would apply to the Coast Guard, Customs and Border Protection, and other Federal agencies and is intended to reduce the administrative burden on ships’s crews, owners, operators, agents and other parties who submit information for clearance.
The Facilitation Committee recognizes the cyber implications of electronic data exchange and plans to collaborate with the IMO Maritime Safety Committee on guidelines to protect these systems.
We are having issues with the comment section on all Coast Guard blogs; the comments are currently closed. Please be assured we are working through the issue and will work to resolve this as soon as possible. In the meantime, please use the “Contact Us” page on the right-hand navigation column if you need to contact the Maritime Commons editor with a question or comment.
This blog is not a replacement or substitute for the formal posting of regulations and updates or existing processes for receiving formal feedback of the same. Links provided on this blog will direct the reader to official source documents, such as the Federal Register, Homeport and the Code of Federal Regulations. These documents remain the official source for regulatory information published by the Coast Guard.
