Business services and lobbying group Business West has reached the finals of a competition for chambers of commerce from across the globe.
The ICC World Chambers Federation 2013 Competition received entries from 65 chambers of commerce and industry from 42 countries.
Business West, which runs the Initiative in Swindon, is the only British organisation to have been selected.
Business West has more than 100 years’ experience assisting exporters through the myriad of international trade and has recently been awarded the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) Excellence in International Trade Award. This nomination is for the Best International Project Award and is in recognition for Business West’s innovative new service Acorn Interactive.
Acorn Interactive provides a revolutionary new platform which can produce all documentation required for any international shipment with single data entry, saving time and money. Not only can exporters do all their documents online, if they lack the resource or time to do this they can utilise Acorn Assist. Acorn Assist is provided by Business West’s team of international experts who can create all the documents for them accurately, quickly and reliably.
Business West has been selected along with chambers from Turkey, China, Slovakia and Tanzania. The selected finalists will present their projects during the ICC World Chamber Federation 8th World Chambers Congress in Doha in April. The Congress, hosted by the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and Industry, is the only forum open to the global community of more than 12,000 Chambers of Commerce.
Business West director of commercial services James Monk said: “We are absolutely delighted to have been selected as a finalist for this award in recognition of our new and innovative product to assist exporters in growing their business. Having been recognised on a national level with our BCC Excellence in International Trade Award it is exciting that we are now being recognised on a worldwide platform, indeed to be the only British Chamber to have been nominated in all five categories is in itself a huge achievement.
“Over the years we have been instrumental in developing a range of innovative international trade services, such as e-cert and our letter of credit service and more recently Acorn Interactive. We are also set to launch a unique online international trade training service. This shows we are at the forefront of export technologies and consistently look for new ways in which to meet exporter’s needs.”
