South Korean government ramps up recovered fiber inspections

The Paper Stock Industries (PSI) Chapter of the Washington-based Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) has provided an update to exporters on conditions in two nations that buy significant tonnages of recovered fiber: South Korea and India.

The government of South Korea has announced 100 percent inspection requirements for recovered paper imports, according to PSI. “Recently in Korea, the import of contaminated or improperly separated recyclable paper has become a social problem,” PSI quotes one ISRI contact in the South Korean government as saying. If the material is deemed legal, he says it will be cleared.

ISRI says it has learned the South Korean government notified the World Trade Organization (WTO) of its intent to put all pulp and recovered paper that is “contaminated with oil or contains foreign substances” under the prior informed consent procedures of the Basel Convention.

For recyclers, that means South Korea is removing a previous exemption and considering the contaminated material as hazardous. ISRI says it will seek a clarification on thresholds for oil contamination and a definition of “foreign substances.”

In India, meanwhile, the COVID-19 virus has caused Prime Minister Narendra Modi to institute a three-week national lockdown starting at midnight March 24.

The lockdown requires citizens to stay at home and allows only “essential” businesses to remain open. Most manufacturing segments outside of health care and food are not deemed essential. “Therefore,” writes PSI, “our recycling customers are closed.”

Seemingly contrary to that, India’s government has deemed “manufacturing units of packaging material for food items, drugs, pharmaceuticals and medical devices” as essential and allowed to remain open. Writes PSI, “It is not clear if this is packaging made from paper, plastic, metals, or a combination and how much of it is made from recovered materials.”

Seaports in India also have been deemed essential and are open, but many employees are not showing up for work out of fear of spreading the virus, says ISRI, citing Boston-based business information provider RISI as its source.

Some cargoes are going unclaimed, “so it is uncertain what will happen when containers that are already en route arrive at port, or what storage and demurrage charges might be incurred,” says PSI. ISRI says it is working through networks in the United States and India to track developments in India.

Concludes PSI, pointing to India’s population of 1.3 billion and its status as being at the front edge of its own possible COVID-19 epidemic, “We can all expect a significant decline in business to and from India during this time.”