EDIFACT (Electronic Data Interchange For Administration, Commerce and Transport)

EDIFACT, short for Electronic Data Interchange For Administration, Commerce and Transport (UN/EDIFACT), is an international EDI standard supervised by the United Nations. This standard offers a set of syntax rules to structure data, an interactive exchange protocol (I-EDI), and standard messages that support multi-country and multi-industry exchange. The United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and Electronic Business (UN/CEFACT) under the UN Economic Commission for Europe manages the maintenance and further development of this standard in the Finance Domain working group UN CEFACT TBG5.

EDIFACT messages play a vital role in ensuring a standardized data exchange and information flow between shipping lines and terminals/ports in the shipping and terminal industry. The efficiency of a terminal depends on receiving timely information about the cargo/containers to be handled. To ensure a minimum data quality and the ability to automatically process messages, the messages follow specific standardized formats.

From the container terminal perspective, various standard messages, such as BAPLIE, COPARN, MOVINS, COPRAR, CODECO, COARRI, etc., are necessary to operate a vessel. These messages are exchanged between the TOS and the outer world, with most messages sent to/from the liner.