Chinese researchers are developing a way to produce livestock feed from factory exhaust gas in a bid to reduce the country’s reliance on imported soybeans, according to a Ministry of Science and Technology newspaper, Caixin reported Nov. 3. The process would synthesize animal feed protein from “simple carbon and nitrogen sources,” the report said, and could decrease U.S. leverage in a trade war by reducing Chinese dependency on U.S. soybeans. The report added that China is the world’s largest importer of soybeans at about 100 million tons per year.
China released a new list of animals, plants and their products that are banned from entering the country, the General Administration of Customs said, according to an unofficial translation. The updated list is meant to comply with a host of Chinese public health laws, and is applicable to inbound passengers, inbound traffic and transportation personnel, personnel entering border markets or special customs supervision areas, and personnel with diplomatic privileges.
China refuses to accept Vietnamese exports at the Thanh Thuy Border Gate, Vietnam's state-run CustomsNews information outlet said Nov. 4. The move may be due to new COVID-19 infections in the Ha Giang Province on Vietnam's side of the gate, CustomsNews reported. The primary goods exported through border crossing are wooden peeled boards, bananas and tapioca starch, CustomsNews said. Authorities on both sides are working toward a solution.
China this week launched its website for self-registration of foreign food production facilities that export to China, the U.S. Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service said in a Nov. 3 report. The website allows customs registrations for certain foreign food, beverage and agricultural exporting facilities (see 2110130022). China plans to publish a “user guide” to the website, USDA said, which is “almost entirely in Chinese.” The agency plans to provide U.S. reports with partial translations of the website and information on the “various data fields that need to be completed.”
Vietnam officially launched a new team of customs officials to meet the customs management requirements for the country's Express-Portal regime, the state-run CustomsNews publication said. Dubbed the Express-Portal Cargo Customs Procedures Team, the group operates under the Huu Nghi Customs Branch and was officially put into commission during a Nov. 1 ceremony. The ceremony also marked the combining of the Co Sau and Po Nhung clearance techniques teams into the Po Nhung-Co Sau Clearance Techniques Team.
China's advanced enterprise certification standards came into effect Nov. 1, the General Administration of Customs announced, according to an unofficial translation. The standards apply to consignees of imports and exports, customs declaration businesses, foreign trade comprehensive service companies, cross-border e-commerce platform companies, inbound and outbound express operators, water transport logistics businesses, highway logistics companies and aviation logistics companies, the notice said.
Japan is looking to allow foreign travel solely for short business trips, study abroad and technical training, with a policy change expected this week, Nikkei Asia reported. While tourists would not be included in this change, the change would be the first move to lift COVID-19-related travel restrictions for Japan. Its coronavirus cases are substantially lower than its record levels over the summer, prompting Japan to gradually loosen its entry ban on foreigners, Nikkei said.
Seaports around the globe are seeing container counts rise as global supply chains continue to hit major snags. The backlog at Singapore Nov. 1 was 22% above its normal capacity, with 53 container ships waiting for a place to dock, Bloomberg reported. Contributing to the wait times were a COVID-19 outbreak in Singapore last week and Typhoon Kompasu outside of Hong Kong and Shenzhen just over two weeks ago. Backups were also noted in several other ports in Southeast Asia on Nov. 1, including 73 ships outside Shanghai, 15 ships at Port Klang in Malaysia and 12 ships at Tanjung Priok outside Jakarta, Indonesia. The supply chain crisis has spilled over into Europe as well, with Greece's port of Piraeus seeing 18 anchored ships, Bloomberg said.
Cambodia and South Korea officially signed their free trade deal (see 2102090036), which is set to eliminate tariffs on 95.6% of Cambodian products and 93.8% of South Korean goods, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council reported Nov. 2. Currently, South Korea mostly exports cars, textiles, machinery, agricultural and marine goods to Cambodia, while Cambodia's main exports to South Korea are agricultural and textile products, HKTDC said.
Hong Kong disposed of three imported shipments of chilled and frozen foods after a year of testing for the COVID-19 virus on imports, the U.S. Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service said in a report released Oct. 28. The three positive shipments came from Indonesia, USDA said, adding that thousands of other imports were tested but deemed negative for the virus. USDA said Hong Kong uses a “hold and test policy” to keep shipments from being released until their COVID detection test results are available, and usually tries to release the goods within 24 hours. Macau recently found no imported foods were contaminated with the virus after testing the shipments for a year (see 2110280005).