| dc.description.abstract | This study aims at understanding maritime dry bulk sector’s resistance upon digitisation of bill of lading. Maritime industry, together with logistics chains in general, has strongly been influenced by the digitalisation wave over the past years, however vast majority of the documentation is still in its original physical form, albeit it is not the most efficient way of handling the cargo documents and in particular the bill of lading in the logistics chain. This study offers understanding about the current sentiments of the key industry stakeholders regarding the subject and whether the electronic bill of lading is considered useful for their business.
The research method of this study is qualitative with multiple case study approach of six cases. This approach helped understanding the reasons behind the slow implementation of electronic bill of lading and how this process could be sped up. Purposive sampling was used as the sampling strategy, while the interviews were carried out via phone or video calls.
The findings of the research suggest, that the maritime industry is extremely conservative and traditional in the way it functions and changing something that has established its position among the stakeholders, even with apparent benefits, takes significant amount of time before reaching wider acceptance.
There are various studies concerning the legal aspects and hindrances of electronic bill of lading. However, no studies related to the key stakeholders’ perception upon a need for an electronic bill of lading were found, and thus this work highlights a new important perspective for understanding the industry resistance in implementing an electronic document handling platform, that would streamline the complexities of this multifaceted, single most important transportation document in the world. | |