Business+Process+Analysis

Business Process Analysis (BPA) is a methodology that supports the analysis of a business with a view to understanding the processes and improving the efficiency and effectiveness of its operations. It describes the processes involved, parties participating, information exchanged and the rules that govern these exchanges.

Relevance for trade facilitation
The conduct of international trade involves numerous and complex transactions and many different parties. The processes and procedures may differ significantly depending on the requirements of the importing and exporting countries, the products concerned and the commercial requirements. Measures to streamline and simplify the processes within a region or country can only be identified and carried out once a clear picture of the current situation has been obtained. BPA is an excellent way to improve efficiency. It provides the means to describe the processes involved ("As-Is” process) and presents diagrams and pictures that can be readily understood by those responsible for trade facilitation work. On the basis of this analysis, unnecessary steps, bottlenecks and __opportunities to simplify__ can be identified. Some examples illustrate typical applications. BPA may be used to design improvements (“To-Be” process) and to specify computer systems to carry out the relevant trade procedures. It has been used by UN/CEFACT as part of their standardization work and has been used to create the Buy-Ship-Pay model. This model can be used as a reference for trade facilitation projects by identifying the scope of a project and can also be extended to reflect additional national or regional requirements without having to start from the beginning.



Trade facilitation projects typically have an inter-organizational scope. Thus many parties are involved and communications and the projects themselves are complex, manifold and highly important. BPA provides a structured approach to such projects.

Use of BPA in trade facilitation projects
If the project intends to implement a best-practice solution as identified in another (i.e. geographical) area, the use of that solution as a reference model is a very efficient approach. The use of BPA enhances the ability to reuse previous work. The diagram below shows how the phases of BPA support the various trade facilitation, harmonization and e-commerce solutions aimed at improving efficiency in trade transactions.



BPA is therefore an important tool for many trade facilitation initiatives that require changing the underlying operations and processes. It is also an important step in project and solution design as it provides an overview and analysis of the actual situation (As-Is), and definitions of change objectives and user requirements.

Usage scenarios for BPA provide an overview to guide a practitioner as to whether certain methodologies fit the project’s needs. BPA is used by major companies in various consulting services and implementation solutions. These tools support BPA and the composition of the deliverables. Trade facilitation projects and the public sector can benefit from this preliminary work. Furthermore, a continuous process should be considered in order to improve trading procedures over a longer time perspective. Requirements change over time; external and internal influences vary and need to be monitored. Organizations establish structures described as Business Process Management to facilitate such goals.