Announcement of Five Chinese Ministries on the Release of Steel Import for Recycled Purposes
Circular Ref: A(21)09
Issue Date: 13 Jan 2021
On 30th December 2020, a joint announcement was made by the Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, the General Administration of Customs, and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology [No. 78 (2020)], which came into effect on 1st January 2021.
The joint announcement is to ‘regulate the import management of recycled steel raw materials and to promote high-quality development of China's steel industry’. Basically,
1. Recycled steel raw materials that meet the standards of "Recycled Steel Raw Materials" (GB/T 39733-2020) are no longer treated as solid waste and are allowed to be imported.
2. As per the ‘Import and Export Tariffs of the People's Republic of China’ and ‘Import and Export Tariff Commodities and Item Notes’, the Customs commodity codes of these recycled steel materials are: 7204100010, 720410010, 7204900010, 720410010, and 7204490030, which covers ships scraps.
3. Steel material imports that do not comply with the national standards of "Recycled Steel Raw Materials" (GB/T 39733-2020) are prohibited.
China reiterated its bans of the import of solid waste in any forms as per a joint announcement by the same five ministries on 24th November 2020 [No. 53 (2020)] and ship scraps were considered as solid waste and were not allowed to be imported. The new announcement on 30th December 2020 excluded recycled steel raw material (including ship scraps) from the ban list and apparently clears the main obstacle of China’s ratification of the “Hong Kong Convention’.