As a grand system project, the "Belt and Road" has always been closely related to the power of financial support. As the world's largest commercial bank, ICBC relies on its international operating network and localization advantages to provide all-round financial services for the construction of the "Belt and Road". On the basis of the "one-single system" bill of lading for multimodal transport, ICBC Sichuan Branch creatively applied blockchain technology and launched the "China-Europe e-Single Pass", which provides convenient cross-border financing services for small and medium-sized enterprises while improving the efficiency of intermodal transport.
Zhou Yue, Vice President of The Sichuan Branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > the background of the "Ce-Eu e-Single Pass" project</h1>
The China-Europe Express Train (Rong-Europe Express Railway) from Chengdu and Lodz, which reaches Poland through Kazakhstan and Russia, is an international trade corridor through Eurasia, plays a leading role in the process of jointly building the "Belt and Road", and has become an important grasp and carrier to promote the smooth trade of the "Belt and Road". Since its opening in 2013, it has connected 25 cities abroad and 14 cities in China, and the number of banks has ranked first in the country for three consecutive years, with a market share of 25%, and the comprehensive heavy load rate has steadily increased, which has effectively driven the open economic development of Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan, Chongqing and other western inland provinces, and is an important node of the new land and sea corridor in the west.
Because China and Russia, Kazakhstan railway gauge is different, can not be directly docked, need to change tracks, and the countries along the way of the waybill standards are not uniform, mostly in accordance with the distance section issued, the waybill is not used as the only certificate when picking up the goods, can not prove the ownership of the goods by the enterprise, so it is impossible to pledge the goods to obtain financing.
In order to promote the import and export trade of China-Europe express trains, Sichuan Qingbaijiang Free Trade Zone has launched a multimodal transport "one single system" bill of lading with railway waybills as the core innovation, which has given the "one single system" a certain property right attribute through process reengineering and institutional innovation, and gradually solved the problems such as the inability of international railway intermodal transport to carry out document transactions, the difficulty of organizing multiple modes of transportation, and the financing difficulties of small and medium-sized foreign trade enterprises. At the second "Belt and Road" International Cooperation Summit Forum, the pilot of the "one single system" rule was released as the outcome of the forum, and the pilot of the "one single system" financial settlement and financing rules carried out by China and Russia for international railway intermodal transport was included in the list of forum outcomes.
ICBC seized the market opportunity and actively contacted provincial and municipal governments to take the lead in piloting the application of the "one single system" in the financial field. However, due to the offline mode of issuance of the "one-single system", although the whole process of cargo transportation is guaranteed to be controllable, it faces a series of problems such as many participants, spanning different jurisdictions, scattered data, high communication costs, and inefficient process coordination. How the "one-single system" integrates with trade finance efficiently and smoothly, how to achieve mutual trust and mutual recognition among cross-border parties, and how to provide trade logistics information support for financing for small and medium-sized enterprises has become a bottleneck restricting their development. How to walk the "last mile" has become a new issue.
< H1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > project exploration and practice</h1>
In view of the above pain points and difficulties, ICBC Sichuan Branch has used cutting-edge technology to innovatively combine blockchain technology with various business links, developed the "China-Europe e-Single Communication" project, launched a new supply chain finance service model of "one single system + cross-border blockchain platform", linked all participants, and created a cross-border trade environment of mutual trust, transparency, efficiency, security and traceability through data connectivity and mutual verification, and built an open and shared cross-border pan-financial ecosystem.
1. Establish a blockchain platform to reshape the "one-single system" delivery model
Led by the head office of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the Sichuan branch is responsible for the implementation, using blockchain, API and other technologies to try to develop the country's first cross-border blockchain platform based on the "one single system" of multimodal transport of China-Europe express trains. The "one-single system" delivery mode first establishes a cooperation alliance by trade participants such as the issuing bank, the notification bank, the multimodal transport operator, and the trade parties, and the bank recognizes the multimodal transport "bill of lading" as the negotiated payment document under the letter of credit, and then the dry port operation company organizes the whole process of transportation and implements the whole process of cargo control, simplifying the processing process and improving the efficiency of trade financing business.
2. Improve institutional safeguards and build a "one-single system" document rule system
The construction of an integrated document rule system is the key to protecting the rights and responsibilities of all parties on the chain, and it is also the basis for extending the financial function of documents. The Sichuan Pilot Free Trade Zone benchmarks the shipping mode, improves the multimodal transport "bill of lading" and supporting rule system, and the dry port operation company, as the issuer of the bill of lading, draws on the international sea bill of lading and the United Nations Convention on International Multimodal Transport of Goods, etc., to design and improve the integrated multimodal transport "bill of lading" style, give the bill of lading the "property right certificate function" attribute, and effectively protect the rights and responsibilities of all parties on the chain from the legal level.
3. Science and technology empowerment to improve the availability of "one single system" financing
Relying on the distributed bookkeeping and consensus mechanism technologies of the "China-Europe e-Single Link" platform, trade parties can timely verify the information on the chain and platform information through timely data and information on the platform, so that trade participants, especially financial institutions, can grasp the latest information on cargo logistics in real time, increasing process transparency and mutual trust between all parties to the transaction. With the increase of platform users, trade background, document information, etc. will be gathered on the "China-Europe e-Single Pass" platform, through the extraction and analysis of big data, laying the foundation for bank rating credit, which is conducive to further improving trade facilitation and financing availability.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > project operation and promotion</h1>
The "China-Europe e-Single Pass" cross-border blockchain platform adheres to market orientation, focuses on the core demands of the whole cycle of enterprises, the reform of the whole industrial chain and the difficulty of enterprise financing, provides a basket of services such as "settlement + financing", promotes cross-border trade facilitation, and achieves good market benefits. The platform was officially launched on October 20, 2019 and officially released at the Second CIIE FinTech Forum. As of the end of April 2020, the "CEIBS e-Single Pass" has 17 on-chain customers, with nearly 300 businesses, involving 12 business regions and a value of more than 360 million yuan, accumulatively handling financing for on-chain enterprises of more than 20 million US dollars, and landing nearly 1 million yuan of online inclusive financing for small and medium-sized enterprises with full credit.
The first phase of the project was widely recognized by the industry, won the title of "High Value Case" at the 2019 Trusted Blockchain Summit, was included in the list of achievements of the Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, and was successfully selected into the book "Implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era and Overcoming Difficult Cases in Reform, Development and Stability" by the Organization Department.
During the anti-epidemic period in 2020, ICBC Sichuan Branch completed the docking of the "China-Europe e-Single Pass" platform and the blockchain platform of China Railway Chengdu Bureau Group Co., Ltd., and landed the railway freight document information of customers in Chengdu and Meishan, realizing the interconnection of financial and logistics information, effectively alleviating the difficulties faced by foreign economic and trade enterprises in the special period, and providing a financial starting point for the development of the province's free trade economy.
< h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > project implications</h1>
1. Do a good job in technical reserves, identify market opportunities, and innovate financial services
Blockchain technology has been widely used in various fields in recent years, and domestic Internet companies and banks have created their own blockchain systems. ICBC has vigorously made technical reserves and set up a blockchain laboratory in Guangzhou, taking blockchain as one of the key frontier areas for the development and application of financial technology.
After the emergence of market opportunities, ICBC Sichuan Branch quickly communicated with the Chengdu Branch of the People's Bank of China, the Sichuan Branch of the State Administration of Foreign Exchange, the Chengdu Municipal Government, the Department of Commerce of Sichuan Province, the Sichuan Free Trade Office and other government agencies, using the blockchain technology platform with independent intellectual property rights, quickly finalized the plan and put it into practice, and opened up a new and efficient model for international trade supply chain financial services.
2. The total score is developed in a coordinated manner, and the domestic and foreign coordination highlights the advantages of the bank
The project has received strong support from the head office of ICBC. At the beginning of the project, the blockchain laboratory of the Guangzhou R&D Department assisted in giving a feasible plan; during the project development process, the development center Chengdu R&D Department gave great technical support to ensure the development progress of the project; during the project launch process, the Sichuan branch and the development center Guangzhou R&D Department, the data center (Beijing) security department, the development center application support department and other close coordination to ensure the smooth launch of the project. At the same time as the project was developed, the International Business Department of Sichuan Branch also contacted overseas institutions such as Moscow and Warsaw to ensure that the business was officially launched after the project was launched.
From demand research to development and launch, the cross-border blockchain platform of "Ce-EUROPE e-Single Pass" fully reflects the advantages of ICBC's total score linkage and domestic and foreign integrated operation, and also allows customers to experience ICBC's responsibility as a state-owned bank.
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" ></h1>
The construction of the "China-Europe e-Single Pass" platform, one is to improve the efficiency of business processing, reduce the time of sending "one single system" bills of lading back and forth under the traditional way, save the cost of enterprises, and promote the facilitation of trade settlement; the second is to verify the authenticity of trade, create a cross-border trade environment of mutual trust, transparency, efficiency, safety and traceability through data connectivity and mutual verification, and build an open and shared cross-border pan-financial ecosystem.
In the future, the platform will continue to expand the circle of friends, combine with the "single window" of customs, introduce all parties such as port supervision, logistics, insurance, law, certification and other parties along the route, and jointly build and operate the platform to achieve cross-border settlement, financing, tariffs and other package customs clearance and trade finance facilities.
In terms of regional expansion, the strategic planning of the new land and sea corridor in the western part of the country has pointed out a broader space for development for us. Sichuan Branch will take Chengdu as the base point, relying on China-Europe express trains, expanding west to Europe, and serving the sea-rail intermodal transport chain between Sichuan and Guangxi, Tianjin and other coastal ports from east to south. Actively give play to the role of financial technology in "improving quality and efficiency", and on this basis, expand the function of domestic and foreign trade finance financial services, and contribute to building Chengdu into a financial center in the west. At the same time, we will use ICBC's international network of 48 countries and 428 institutions around the world to provide supporting localization financial services for import and export trading enterprises along the "Belt and Road".
Helping the ancient Silk Road to rejuvenate, gradually weaving a "network of nations" connecting all parties and links on the chain, covering the world, and sharing win-win results with the majority of partners is the goal of ICBC's "China-Europe e-single communication" platform, and it is also the original intention that it will never forget.
![Zhou Yue, Vice President of the Sichuan Branch of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, visited the school[fig]](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP///wAAACwAAAAAAQABAAACAkQBADs=)