- Email: [email protected]
Automated trade information processing
Reports
Telecommunications
type was introduced in 1969. Shanghai factory No 13, one of the eight manufacturing plants we visited, reported production of 400 sixty channel bays in 1977. A substantial number of China’s long distance trunks are still provided through open-wire carrier systems. Standard twelve channel open-wire has been carrier equipment transistorized recently and packaged in compact assemblies. This system is produced in quantity. It was exhibited at the Canton Export Fair in mid-October, 1977. While open-wire carrier has all but disappeared from both transmission lines of the production and industrialized countries, China’s current system may be of interest as a product to some developing countries. The Peking Long-Distance Telecommunications Centre has a large, modern operator room. This office handles about 50000 domestic and 2000 international calls per day. The number of telephones in Peking is given as 200 000. While this means only about a 2% density per population, it is a respectable figure, considering China’s previous low level of telephone development. In all of China, there are said to be 5 000 000 phones, which give a nationwide density of 0.6%. One should be wary of making international comparisons based on such statistics, for China’s political and social system has placed higher priority on other communication, eg modes of broadcasting. Thus, the future growth of the telephone in China is not a purely economic matter.
planning
Little could be learned during the trip about planning for telecommunication services. It was explained that telephone service priorities follow the logical guidelines of meeting the most urgent needs first. Connections for government factories and offices, communes therefore take priority over those for private houses. China’s society is still predominantly rural. It would appear that current CCITT studies on the problems of rural telecommunications might be of particular interest in China.2 However, it is not clear if the same urgent demand for rural telephone service will be formulated in China as has been noted in many other developing countries. At present the plan is to extend the national network to every hsien (county), of which there are about 2000, but not yet to every village. State of technology Traditional Chinese ingenuity is now being forcefully applied to the goal of self-sufficiency in high technology A complete, home-built products. satellite earth station is on exhibit in Peking (the earth stations now operating in China had to be imported). The demonstration of a Chinese-made earth station at the permanent exhibition, ‘Learning from Tuching’ has deep significance: Taching, meaning ‘great celebration’, is the name given to a new industrial center in the northeast (the former Manchuria). Large oilfields were
developed there, after the Soviet Union withdrew its expertise and supplies from China (about 1960). Taching has become symbolic for China’s ‘can do’ spirit that extends to the most sophisticated electronic technology. Advanced work in integrated circuit technology was observed at Shanghai’s radio factory No 14. Conventional circuit for printed assembly. transmission and computer equipment could be seen at other factories in Peking, Nanking and Shanghai.
Outlook The pace of telecommunication development in China is accelerating. China seems to have the wherewithal for self-sufficiency, even in the most advanced technology; it is a queston only of the time and investment required. One of the most important questions remainining is the extent to telecommunication which Chinese engineers, managers and planners can be expected to exchange their ideas and achievements through publications and travel. Gerd
D. Wallenstein,
Consultant, A therton,
CA,
USA ’ ‘New communications microwave system’, China Reconstructs, Vol 26, No 6, 1977, pp 42-43; and ‘New China’s post and telecommunications’, China’s Foreign Trade, No 3, 1977, pp 20-21. Wallenstein, ‘Rural ‘G. telecommunications in developing countries: target of international collaboration’, Tehcommunication Journal, Vol 44, No 12, 1977,pp597-600.
Automated trade information processing COSTPRO
is
Procedures, federal
and
companies,
the
Canadian
a not-for-profit provincial
corporation
and by a research It is the official
international
fora
currently
developing
deal
representative with
a date exchange
the
industry
and development
The outlook for business is becoming brighter in most industrialized western nations, but in Canada falling levels of both productivity and investment continue to make business cautious about
162
for
supported
governments,
of Transport.
which
Organization
the
by the
of
Trade
membership
associations
and
of
private
grant from the federal Ministry of Canadian
facilitation
network
Simplification
of
interests trade.
in those
COSTPRO
is
for business and government.
the prospects for an early return to economic health. Canadians traditionally look to the balance of trade for comfort in times of economic distress: 24% of the nation’s
Gross National Product is derived from selling its goods and services abroad. But as both productivity and investment fall Canadian products are finding it harder to remain competitive in world markets; the balance of payments has itself become cause for concern. Fifty percent of Canadars labour force is occupied in processing information, and more than 1% of its Gross National Product (GNP) is spent by business each year simply on stocking, filling, copying and filing trade
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
POLICY June 1978
ReportslViewpoinl
documents and on expediting shipments. When we add to this figure the cost of tracking down information needed before the documentation exercise can begin and the costs incurred for postage, demurrage, employing capital to expand misused warehousing facilities and using human productive capacity in an overhead activity, the total cost of processing trade information in Canada is beyond imagining, but certainly not less than 3% of GNP - well into the billions of dollars. Who pays these costs? In the first instance it is those who make direct use the trading of the information, community itself: shippers, banks, brokers, carriers, forwarders, insurance companies and governments, federal and provincial. But in the final analysis it is the beleagured individual citizen who pays the bill in the form of a premium on goods consumed and high taxes to support the bureaucracy which collects and sifts the information for decision-making material. Automation Seems to be the way to go about developing a more effective trade information processing system. The question is, automation in what form, on what scale and within what time frame?
Common denominator Traditional automated systems have not been able to cope with the volatility and volume of trade data. A common denominator had to be found to tie the diverse activities of trade together. We at COSTPRO identified this as the trade data element - the smallest meaningful
unit of trade information, whether a part of a document relating to a specific shipment, or a piece of trade intelligence on routes, rates, (eg information facilities and market opportunities). Beginning with the data element enabled us to avoid being overwhelmed by the size of the task at hand. It also permitted us to recognize two key characteristics of the trade information processing activity which could be automated at the individual user level as the basis for a national trade information system. The first of these is transaction processing. In its basic form, trade is nothing more than the exchange of goods and payments via a series of tiusiness transactions. Since transaction processing is a function of clerks, not cybernetics specialists or executives, we concluded that the system COSTPRO develops must automate activity at the point of action. The second characteristic is the pooling and exchange of information. Trade intelligence is held in the public domain and accessed by the various’ members of the trading community before they initiate their respective segments of a transaction. Furthermore, 80% of the information needed to process a trade transaction appears on the commercial invoice prepared by subsequent parties to the transaction. To accommodate the pooling and exchange of information the system must be designed to operate as a communications network. By combining these two design criteria with the data element level approach, the concept of a trade data element exchange (TRADEX) system
was derived, in which affordable devices would access remote trade intelligence, process transactions and transmit and receive trade documents directly to and from any other such device. The devices would operate in a network similar to that of the telephone rather than the traditional host-terminal configuration. The TRADEX network will be accessed via the terminal to prepare and transmit trade documents, secure trade intelligence and ascertain the status of goods in transit. It will eventually be the means of interfacing with an electronic funds transfer system. Trade and transport statistics will be generated as a byproduct of the transaction processing activity and will provide local, regional and federal governments with accurate material for planning purposes while relieving industry of the burden of reporting statistics.’ Recognizing that the federal and provincial governments would respond to pressure from the private sector to establish their components of the network, COSTPRO has concentrated its efforts on developing prototypes of the TRADEX terminal and refining its design in conjunction with potential users. A series of tests is being undertaken in 1978-79, with more than 1000 Canadian organizations, to determine the exact functional requirements of the terminal. By the end of 1979 it is expected that 1% of the country’s trade transactions will be handled by thenetwork. ’ For further information on the design, operation and control of the COSTPROTRAOEX network, see the at&e by Nora MC Hockin. ‘Data networks for business and government’, elsewhere in this issue.
Viewpoint Interconnect
in the UK?
George G. McKendrick, of Chrysler international SA, summarizes the position of the Telecommunications Managers Division of the Institute of Administrative Management.
The Institute of Administrative Management is the only organization in the UK specializing in the promotion of administrative management in industry, commerce and government. The depth
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
of its interest in and involvement with communications is evidenced by the fact that it has a Telecommunications Managers Division (TMD) which provides a forum for those members
POLICY June 1978
engaged full-time in the management of telecommunications. This group numbers over 300 and represents the majority of such people in the UK. The TMD is recognized by the Post Office (PO), the Post Office Users’ National Council and the telecommunications industry as representing the business user in its field.
163
Telecommunications
type was introduced in 1969. Shanghai factory No 13, one of the eight manufacturing plants we visited, reported production of 400 sixty channel bays in 1977. A substantial number of China’s long distance trunks are still provided through open-wire carrier systems. Standard twelve channel open-wire has been carrier equipment transistorized recently and packaged in compact assemblies. This system is produced in quantity. It was exhibited at the Canton Export Fair in mid-October, 1977. While open-wire carrier has all but disappeared from both transmission lines of the production and industrialized countries, China’s current system may be of interest as a product to some developing countries. The Peking Long-Distance Telecommunications Centre has a large, modern operator room. This office handles about 50000 domestic and 2000 international calls per day. The number of telephones in Peking is given as 200 000. While this means only about a 2% density per population, it is a respectable figure, considering China’s previous low level of telephone development. In all of China, there are said to be 5 000 000 phones, which give a nationwide density of 0.6%. One should be wary of making international comparisons based on such statistics, for China’s political and social system has placed higher priority on other communication, eg modes of broadcasting. Thus, the future growth of the telephone in China is not a purely economic matter.
planning
Little could be learned during the trip about planning for telecommunication services. It was explained that telephone service priorities follow the logical guidelines of meeting the most urgent needs first. Connections for government factories and offices, communes therefore take priority over those for private houses. China’s society is still predominantly rural. It would appear that current CCITT studies on the problems of rural telecommunications might be of particular interest in China.2 However, it is not clear if the same urgent demand for rural telephone service will be formulated in China as has been noted in many other developing countries. At present the plan is to extend the national network to every hsien (county), of which there are about 2000, but not yet to every village. State of technology Traditional Chinese ingenuity is now being forcefully applied to the goal of self-sufficiency in high technology A complete, home-built products. satellite earth station is on exhibit in Peking (the earth stations now operating in China had to be imported). The demonstration of a Chinese-made earth station at the permanent exhibition, ‘Learning from Tuching’ has deep significance: Taching, meaning ‘great celebration’, is the name given to a new industrial center in the northeast (the former Manchuria). Large oilfields were
developed there, after the Soviet Union withdrew its expertise and supplies from China (about 1960). Taching has become symbolic for China’s ‘can do’ spirit that extends to the most sophisticated electronic technology. Advanced work in integrated circuit technology was observed at Shanghai’s radio factory No 14. Conventional circuit for printed assembly. transmission and computer equipment could be seen at other factories in Peking, Nanking and Shanghai.
Outlook The pace of telecommunication development in China is accelerating. China seems to have the wherewithal for self-sufficiency, even in the most advanced technology; it is a queston only of the time and investment required. One of the most important questions remainining is the extent to telecommunication which Chinese engineers, managers and planners can be expected to exchange their ideas and achievements through publications and travel. Gerd
D. Wallenstein,
Consultant, A therton,
CA,
USA ’ ‘New communications microwave system’, China Reconstructs, Vol 26, No 6, 1977, pp 42-43; and ‘New China’s post and telecommunications’, China’s Foreign Trade, No 3, 1977, pp 20-21. Wallenstein, ‘Rural ‘G. telecommunications in developing countries: target of international collaboration’, Tehcommunication Journal, Vol 44, No 12, 1977,pp597-600.
Automated trade information processing COSTPRO
is
Procedures, federal
and
companies,
the
Canadian
a not-for-profit provincial
corporation
and by a research It is the official
international
fora
currently
developing
deal
representative with
a date exchange
the
industry
and development
The outlook for business is becoming brighter in most industrialized western nations, but in Canada falling levels of both productivity and investment continue to make business cautious about
162
for
supported
governments,
of Transport.
which
Organization
the
by the
of
Trade
membership
associations
and
of
private
grant from the federal Ministry of Canadian
facilitation
network
Simplification
of
interests trade.
in those
COSTPRO
is
for business and government.
the prospects for an early return to economic health. Canadians traditionally look to the balance of trade for comfort in times of economic distress: 24% of the nation’s
Gross National Product is derived from selling its goods and services abroad. But as both productivity and investment fall Canadian products are finding it harder to remain competitive in world markets; the balance of payments has itself become cause for concern. Fifty percent of Canadars labour force is occupied in processing information, and more than 1% of its Gross National Product (GNP) is spent by business each year simply on stocking, filling, copying and filing trade
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
POLICY June 1978
ReportslViewpoinl
documents and on expediting shipments. When we add to this figure the cost of tracking down information needed before the documentation exercise can begin and the costs incurred for postage, demurrage, employing capital to expand misused warehousing facilities and using human productive capacity in an overhead activity, the total cost of processing trade information in Canada is beyond imagining, but certainly not less than 3% of GNP - well into the billions of dollars. Who pays these costs? In the first instance it is those who make direct use the trading of the information, community itself: shippers, banks, brokers, carriers, forwarders, insurance companies and governments, federal and provincial. But in the final analysis it is the beleagured individual citizen who pays the bill in the form of a premium on goods consumed and high taxes to support the bureaucracy which collects and sifts the information for decision-making material. Automation Seems to be the way to go about developing a more effective trade information processing system. The question is, automation in what form, on what scale and within what time frame?
Common denominator Traditional automated systems have not been able to cope with the volatility and volume of trade data. A common denominator had to be found to tie the diverse activities of trade together. We at COSTPRO identified this as the trade data element - the smallest meaningful
unit of trade information, whether a part of a document relating to a specific shipment, or a piece of trade intelligence on routes, rates, (eg information facilities and market opportunities). Beginning with the data element enabled us to avoid being overwhelmed by the size of the task at hand. It also permitted us to recognize two key characteristics of the trade information processing activity which could be automated at the individual user level as the basis for a national trade information system. The first of these is transaction processing. In its basic form, trade is nothing more than the exchange of goods and payments via a series of tiusiness transactions. Since transaction processing is a function of clerks, not cybernetics specialists or executives, we concluded that the system COSTPRO develops must automate activity at the point of action. The second characteristic is the pooling and exchange of information. Trade intelligence is held in the public domain and accessed by the various’ members of the trading community before they initiate their respective segments of a transaction. Furthermore, 80% of the information needed to process a trade transaction appears on the commercial invoice prepared by subsequent parties to the transaction. To accommodate the pooling and exchange of information the system must be designed to operate as a communications network. By combining these two design criteria with the data element level approach, the concept of a trade data element exchange (TRADEX) system
was derived, in which affordable devices would access remote trade intelligence, process transactions and transmit and receive trade documents directly to and from any other such device. The devices would operate in a network similar to that of the telephone rather than the traditional host-terminal configuration. The TRADEX network will be accessed via the terminal to prepare and transmit trade documents, secure trade intelligence and ascertain the status of goods in transit. It will eventually be the means of interfacing with an electronic funds transfer system. Trade and transport statistics will be generated as a byproduct of the transaction processing activity and will provide local, regional and federal governments with accurate material for planning purposes while relieving industry of the burden of reporting statistics.’ Recognizing that the federal and provincial governments would respond to pressure from the private sector to establish their components of the network, COSTPRO has concentrated its efforts on developing prototypes of the TRADEX terminal and refining its design in conjunction with potential users. A series of tests is being undertaken in 1978-79, with more than 1000 Canadian organizations, to determine the exact functional requirements of the terminal. By the end of 1979 it is expected that 1% of the country’s trade transactions will be handled by thenetwork. ’ For further information on the design, operation and control of the COSTPROTRAOEX network, see the at&e by Nora MC Hockin. ‘Data networks for business and government’, elsewhere in this issue.
Viewpoint Interconnect
in the UK?
George G. McKendrick, of Chrysler international SA, summarizes the position of the Telecommunications Managers Division of the Institute of Administrative Management.
The Institute of Administrative Management is the only organization in the UK specializing in the promotion of administrative management in industry, commerce and government. The depth
TELECOMMUNICATIONS
of its interest in and involvement with communications is evidenced by the fact that it has a Telecommunications Managers Division (TMD) which provides a forum for those members
POLICY June 1978
engaged full-time in the management of telecommunications. This group numbers over 300 and represents the majority of such people in the UK. The TMD is recognized by the Post Office (PO), the Post Office Users’ National Council and the telecommunications industry as representing the business user in its field.
163