Digital trade has become a crucial aspect of the entire industry, rather than being just an abstract idea, thereby changing the picture of global trade, depending severely on the free cross-border movement of data. Keeping that in mind, most offline or physical documentation or transactions are being shifted to a digital or electronic version. These digital documents are to be treated like their physical counterparts in the future.
The Ministry of Industry and Foreign Trade has agreed to accept import documents such as the Certificate of Origin, and the Commercial Invoice submitted either electronically or on paper. This is based on the General Authority for Export and Import Control’s approval to the Ministry of Finance officials for accepting electronic (digital) documents as the original.
The Egyptian Customs authority has also issued a circular stating that one can accept commercial invoices for imported shipments without seals whenever they are issued by the producing companies with the company’s logo and uploaded by the foreign supplier and with his knowledge through the CargoX platform, and approved by the importer.
Before this circular was issued, seals were a required field on the invoice. If the name was not mentioned in any case, then the importer was asked to bring an official letter that connects the trader with the producer.
Standing today, if the trader issues his own documents with his logo, it would also be accepted, as long as the commercial invoice mandatorily states the name of the sawmill.
The Timber Exchange platform, as a B2B supply chain automation tool that aims to automate global trade through a custom platform that focuses on three core pillars - B2B Marketplace, 100+ Advance Supply Chain Tools, and a constantly updated Market Data Hub is integrated with CargoX and Nafeza so that importers and exporters can easily automate and comply with the recent ACI regulations of Egypt. We also provide expert advice on the subject.