Saturday Nov 07, 2026
Saturday Nov 07, 2026
Saturday, 7 November 2026 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
Treasury Secretary Dr. Harshana Suriyapperuma (standing, centre) at the launch of OneTRADE, the National Single Window for Trade
Nearly 30 years since the project was first mooted, the National Single Window for Trade, an online portal intended to replace duplicated paper filings to Customs, quarantine, port and other agencies with a single submission, went live this week with two export sectors admitted and no timetable published for the rest.
A private sector exporter created the first Customs Declaration (CusDec) through the platform on the launch day on Thursday (5) the Finance, Planning and Economic Development Ministry said.
Onboarding is sector by sector, beginning with coconut and tea. The Treasury said the system would be opened to other sectors “in the near future” once it “is further refined based on the go-live findings”. No date was given.
The portal, branded OneTRADE, is a joint initiative of the Finance Ministry, the Ministry of Digital Economy and GovTech Sri Lanka Ltd., a state-owned software company. The Lanka Software Foundation supported the build.
A single window is required under Article 10.4 of the World Trade Organisation’s Trade Facilitation Agreement. Sri Lanka submitted its instrument of ratification on 31 May 2016, becoming the 81st member to do so. Its implementation of agreement commitments, measured by the WTO, stands at 34.9% against a schedule running to 2030.
The project has moved slowly since work began in 1993. The World Bank completed a 12-volume blueprint in 2018, but the documents were mislaid and had to be resubmitted in July 2019. Cabinet approved a phased rollout with World Bank funding only in June 2022, and the Government allocated Rs. 200 million in June 2023 to establish a project implementation unit.
Comparable systems abroad give a measure of the potential gain. A World Bank study cited by the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce found single windows cut import and export processing time by 30-40%. Singapore’s TradeNet reduced processing from four days to 10 minutes, and South Korea’s system cut transaction costs by 60%.
For exporters the immediate effect is administrative, replacing counter visits and repeat submissions with one lodgement. Whether the savings materialise depends on how many agencies are connected, which the Ministry has not disclosed.
