We have obtained the captioned information from Huatai Insurance Agency & Consultant Service Ltd., our correspondent in Xiamen, China, which is as follows:

With the increasing awareness of environmental protection in China, the Chinese government issued more and more strict regulations to prevent and control pollution, including enhancing solid waste importation control.

On 10 August 2017, the Ministry of Environmental Protection, the Ministry of Commerce and three other ministries jointly issued the announcement regarding updated Administrative Catalogue of Waste Importation (2017) which has become effective from 31 December 2017. This Catalogue added 24 types of solid waste listed under 4 categories to the import ban list, including 8 types of waste plastic from living sources, 1 type of unsorted waste paper, 11 types of waste raw materials of textile and 4 types of vanadium slag.

Legal Consequences

According to the relevant regulations of China, if dumping, sorting and disposing the foreign solid waste in China, importing the banned solid waste or the restricted solid waste without licence,the customs shall order to return the solid waste, and a fine of not less than RMB100,000 yuan but not more than RMB1,000,000 yuan may be imposed.  If the act constitutes a crime, criminal charges may be brought up.  If the importer is unknown, the carrier shall be liable for returning the solid waste or bear the disposal cost of the solid waste. 

Recommendations

It is suggested that the owners should take relevant measures to verify that the shipments do not belong to the banned or restricted solid waste before accepting the booking, including requesting the book party to provide accurate information, customs code and relevant licence of the shipment.