ITDS Board Report Considers AES Functionality for Additional Agencies' Export Needs
In its fiscal year 2010 report to Congress on the International Trade Data System1, the ITDS Board made one export-related recommendation and discussed future plans for export functionality in ITDS.
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Recommends Seeing if AES Could be Enhanced for More ITDS Agencies
The only export-related recommendation made in the report on the development of ITDS was that by the summer of 2011, CBP, Census, and other appropriate agencies should examine the potential for enhancing the Automated Export System (AES) to provide functionality for additional ITDS agencies (also known as Participating Government Agencies or PGAs), including a detailed examination of ITDS agencies export requirements.
Discusses Ways to Enhance ITDS Export Functionality
The ITDS report also discusses other ways that export functionality could be enhanced in the future, including:
Implement export functionality quickly, with existing funds. The report notes that although relatively little work has been done on ITDS export functionality, there may be an opportunity to build on existing systems and implement ITDS export functionality relatively quickly and with existing ITDS funding.
Currently, exporters must file electronic export information (commodity information) under Department of Commerce rules through AES. In addition to capturing data about the commodities being shipped, AES already captures export control information. By expanding AES to improve the oversight of export controlled items, the export missions of several ITDS agencies may be directly supported.
Create AES-USXPort interface. The ITDS Board is beginning work with the Export Control Reform Task Force who is working to expand the capabilities of a Department of Defense automated export licensing application system, USXPort.
An interface between AES and the future enhanced USXPort could potentially yield great benefits. Specifically, the oversight of controlled exports could be strengthened and the ability of exporters to comply with Federal rules improved.
Connect export manifest system to AES. While AES and AESDirect capture commodity information reported by the U.S. exporter, the actual departure of exported commodities is reported by the exporting carriers. An automated export manifest system that could connect with AES could improve export enforcement through electronic processing and use of risk management systems.
The report notes that while there is currently a limited automated export manifest system on which to build ITDS functionality, a longer term solution for building export functionality for all ITDS agencies that may limit costs, would be to build on the work currently being done for the inbound manifest.
CBP has recently worked with several ITDS agencies to develop and identify high level export business processes that will support identification of current system capabilities that could be utilized for this work.
1ITDS is not a separate computer system but consists of functionality being built and funded through the ACE (Automated Commercial Environment) project, a modernization and expansion of automated systems for processing imports and exports operated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
(See ITT’s Online Archives or 03/02/11 news, 11030232, for previous BP summary on the ITDS FY 2010 report.)