Digitization and decarbonization are two challenges that the logistics industry has been actively addressing in 2023. With generative AI’s capacity to understand and produce content and the International Maritime Organization aiming for shipping to be climate neutral by or around 2050, the momentum is there to do more in 2024. This is the opinion not only of the private sector but also of the EU whose regulations will either be passed or take effect in 2024.
Understanding the impact of these laws and complying with them will be the challenge of 2024.
The EU had planned to finalize its AI act by the end of 2023, the US published an executive order shortly before the “AI Safety Summit” Britain organized last November, while the G7 started in 2023 drafting a code of conduct for AI firms, and last October China unveiled its “Global AI Governance Initiative.” Whatever comes out of these discussions will probably be passed into law in 2024 and might impact the way generative AI has been used in logistics until now, that is, mainly combined with computer vision and robotic process automation to accelerate document processing.
In 2023, two key European texts passed into law: the integration of maritime shipping into the Emission Trading Scheme and the Carbon Adjustment Mechanism. The laws require carriers and shippers importing into the EU to go into detailed reporting about the emissions of their ships, if they happen to be cargo and passenger ships of or above 5,000 gross tonnage, and of the goods they produce outside of the EU, if they include iron, steel, cement, aluminum, electricity, fertilizer, hydrogen and some upstream and downstream products — in pure or processed form.
2024 will be busy complying with European regulations.