The Center is assisting governments of countries in the Western Hemisphere as well as the private sector to navigate the many legal difficulties of the increasingly important aspects of e-commerce. To achieve this end, in September 1999 the Center cosponsored a conference, Responding to Legal Obstacles to Electronic Commerce in Latin America, which identified and addressed the major problems limiting effective expansion of electronic commerce. These efforts ultimately culminated in the drafting of the Inter-American Rules for Electronic Documents and Signatures (IAREDS) — lead authored by the Center’s Research Director, Dra. Mariana Silveira — which were completed in October 2001. In February 2002, the CIDIP-VI meeting convened by the Organization of American States recognized the need to enable the use of electronic documents and signatures and issued a resolution recommending member states to adopt legislation consistent with the instruments developed by the U.N. Commission on International Trade Law and further encouraging members states to consider the incorporation into their national law of the principles embodied in IAREDS.

In addition to promoting the adoption of IAREDS, the Center has continued to undertake research and compile e-commerce related developments in the inter-American context, including a follow-up on pilot project proposals underway by CARICOM and the member states of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States, as well as country-specific legislation and draft bills.

The Center’s Research Director, Mariana Silveira, continues to lecture and publish on the topic of e-commerce — and more specifically IAREDS — in furtherance of greater acceptance of IAREDS principles and their beneficial trade capacity building impact for developing countries.