India agrees to clear scrap consignments

Archiv – The Brussels-based Bureau of International recycling (BIR) has successfully convinced Indian authorities to clear scrap consignments. After talks between BIR and the Indian authorities, the Department of Excise & Customs of the Indian Ministry of Finance has decided to ban with immediate effect seven inspection agencies and to refuse any pre-shipment inspection certificates issued by these agencies for import of metallic scrap.
The Brussels-based Bureau of International recycling (BIR) has successfully convinced Indian authorities to clear scrap consignments. After talks between BIR and the Indian authorities, the Department of Excise & Customs of the Indian Ministry of Finance has decided to ban with immediate effect seven inspection agencies and to refuse any pre-shipment inspection certificates issued by these agencies for import of metallic scrap.
As two notices, issued on September 15 and October 5, 2005, were not widely circulated, pre-inspection certificates were still issued after these dates with many shipments being already en-route to India and the obvious consequences that containers/vessels would be refused upon arrivals.
With the assistance of BIR Ambassador for India, Ikbal Nathani, a letter was sent on November 18, 2005 to the the Ministry of Commerce and Industry in New Delhi urging the Indian authorities to clear the cargo with the certificate from any of the seven banned inspection agencies for which certified consignments were already en-route.
BIR has now announced that with Policy Circular dated November 21 2005, the Indian Authorities have decided that ’consignments of metallic scrap where the bill of lading is December 1 and where certificates have been issued by these agancies, will be cleared by customs ‘€’ but with 100% inspection according to customs circular No. 56, dated October 10 2005’.