Un/Edifact - Edi, The Development Of Un/edifact, Edi Competition And Harmonization, The Future Of Edi And Edifact

As both international and electronic commercial activity escalated dramatically in the closing decades of the 20th century and into the 2000s, businesses, governments, and international economic and trade organizations recognized the growing importance of standardizing the protocols used to transmit electronic data. If such protocols were inconsistent or competing within and across industries and international borders, the overall flow of international commerce could ebb, to the eventual detriment of all players. Thus, the 1980s and 1990s were marked by efforts to harmonize the various standards of electronic data transactions. To facilitate this process, the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe developed the United Nations rules for Electronic Data Interchange For Administration, Commerce, and Transport (UN/EDIFACT).