The 17th meeting of the UIC Covid-19 Task Force was attended remotely on 2 March 2021 by around 50 participants from across the globe.

Marc Guigon, Chair of the Task Force, welcomed the participants and gave an overview of presentations to come, with a particular focus on digital vaccination certificates and travel passes in view of facilitating travel in the coming months.

A series of interesting presentations were delivered by representatives from ERA (European Union Agency for Railways), IATA (International Air Transport Association) and Israel Railways.

The key themes of the presentations included:

• European Digital Passenger Locator Form – ERA’s involvement, Stefan Jugelt, Head of the development of the technical standards for telematics applications for passengers and freight, ERA
  Focus on developing a more efficient collection and storage of passenger data through the Personal Locator Form

• Airlines’ Global Approach to Health Credentials Marie Masserey, Head Industry Architecture, IATA
  Focus on building a solution that demonstrates the vision of an open standard-based approach (IATA Travel Pass) so that passengers can potentially share their passport and health data with airlines and border authorities

• Vaccine and general impact on the population and traffic Robert Simhaev, Emergency Preparedness Manager, Security Division, Israel Railways
  Focus on the current situation in Israel where a significant percentage of the population has been vaccinated or holds a Green Pass, facilitating access to more services

• Comments from other TF members

All guidance documents can be consulted on UIC’s dedicated Covid-19 webpage, which is regularly updated with the latest video, news articles, webinars and other audiovisual material: https://uic.org/covid-19

As a reminder, the Task Force LinkedIn group is open to members. Feel free to join the group and share your thoughts: https://lnkd.in/eEKqfW2

The next Task Force web-conference is scheduled to take place on 30 March 2021. Members are asked to give details of their expectations of future meetings.