Steve Parker Director General, BIFA
It’s certainly been a busy first couple of months in the hot seat. January saw BIFA enjoy our annual awards luncheon, another great day and extremely successful. My congratulations go to all the award winners.
As we move swiftly through the first quarter of 2023 there are several important topics on BIFA’s agenda affecting the work of our members. Many are regulatory related to changes to CDS Exports, ICS2 and NCTS5.
February saw BIFA partner with Descartes Systems, a leading provider of on-demand, software-as-a-service solutions, to deliver a webinar that provided important insight and guidance on the forthcoming introduction of the ICS Release 2.
ICS Release 2 will require full entry summary declarations for all air cargo movements. This release builds on the PLACI requirements and introduces the need for economic operators to submit pre-arrival entry summary declarations; notification of the arrival of active means of transport upon entry into the EU; as well as notification of presentation of goods.
One of BIFA’s remits is the provision of information and guidance on technical matters delivered via multiple channels. The webinar delivered timely advice.
Environmental responsibility
We also have plans to prepare the industry for the longer term. In this respect we are ramping up our activities with regards to sustainability. We have already engaged with Pledge, a third-party business that can support us in the short term on this issue, but it is our intent to strengthen our knowledge within the secretariat. The need to understand and address the environmental impact of freight forwarders’ activities within global supply chains grows by the day.
Our members are facing increasing pressure from regulators, business partners, and consumers amongst others, in favour of business initiatives and good practice that are deemed environmentally friendly.
At a business level, our members are increasingly seeing tenders that demand actual evidence of what they are doing to reduce harmful emissions and undertake their operations in a more sustainable manner.
There is a clear direction of travel on this subject and we want to help BIFA members, small and large, who may need some support on where to start when it comes to taking effective action to understand and reduce their carbon footprint.
The co-operation with Pledge will see the latter provide BIFA with resources that will help to support members on their journey to having operations that are more environmentally sustainable.
Those resources will be designed to deliver guidance to members and will address what needs to be considered as the main environmental issues, the challenges they pose whilst providing advice on the steps that they should take to launch an environmental policy or enhance an existing one.
Talent pool
There has also been a great response to the recent launch of BIFA’s ‘Freight Development Pathway’. Delivered in partnership with Manpower, the initiative is aimed at helping to identify, attract and train suitable candidates from outside of the freight forwarding and logistics for career opportunities in the sector.
By the time this column is published, the first delegates should have completed their three-week employability programme and hopefully some, or all of them, will have become part of the pool of talent that will be work and industry-ready for BIFA members.
Finally, best wishes for the remainder of 2023. I look forward to becoming a regular correspondent for Freight Industry Times and hearing feedback on the things I write about.
For more information, visit: www.bifa.org