A representative from China’s General Administration of Customs (GAC) has acknowledged that scrap traders are running into bottlenecks at Chinese ports and outlined one measure the agency is taking in hopes of alleviating the situation.
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| Chen Zejun |
Speaking at the 2014 convention of the China Nonferrous Metals Association Recycling Metal Branch (CMRA), held in early November in Guangzhou, China, Chen Zejun of the GAC’s Guangzhou Merchandise Valuation and Information Office, said the GAC is “focusing on fast declarations and customs clearance” in Guangdong Province.
A pilot project in that South China province is known as the “one declaration” system. “In the past it might take two days to two weeks with three different procedures involved,” said Chen. “We are trying to go faster with this model. You only need to declare [your inbound shipment] once and then immediately examination and clearance will start—at the same time, not one-by-one in sequence,” said Chen. “We hope it will be rolled out to other areas,” she added.
Traders gathered at the convention commented that the pilot system has the benefit of eliminating the need to unload and reload a container more than once for different inspections. However, it can still entail a wait time while trying to schedule inspectors from both the GAC and the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ) to arrive at the same time.
Scrap exporters from Europe and North America expressed discontent with China’s costly inspection regimes overall, citing redundancy between requirements and inspections of the GAC, AQSIQ, the Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) and the CCIC (China Certification and Inspection Group), which inspects shipments bound for China before they leave ports in other parts of the world.
Chen, who has worked on scrap-related issues for the GAC for more than 10 years, said, “I feel very close to this industry and have a deep understanding of the industry.” She outlined a series of rights and obligations attached to GAC and to scrap importers, including the rights of importers to seek quick clearance of their containers and to negotiate the value of their shipments.
She suggested that importers continue to put in the effort to understand customs procedures and that they strictly provide “true declarations” for every shipment. Both the GAC and importers need to “fight against fraud in order to safeguard fair competition and prevent market disorder,” stated Chen.
The 2014 CMRA Annual Convention was held at the Dongfang Hotel in Guangzhou, China, Nov. 7-9.