Indonesia Delays Paper Restrictions, Vietnam to Ban Plastic Imports

After Indonesia announced that more stringent paper import restrictions would take effect on April 1, Indonesian officials have now postponed those rules until further notice.

According to a Resource Recycling report, Indonesian inspection company KSO Sucofindo-Surveyor Indonesia sent a letter on March 22 outlining increased inspection and bale quality requirements for recovered fiber shipments. That letter said Indonesian customs agents would begin inspecting 100 percent of shipments.

However, in a March 29 follow-up letter, the company wrote that the guidelines have been “approved to be postponed in advance until further notice,” according to Resource Recycling. The letter also notes that inspections will be limited to 10 percent of incoming loads.

In addition, Vietnam has reiterated its plan to phase out scrap plastic imports and ban all plastic imports by 2025. Resource Recycling reports that Vietnam imported 165 million pounds of scrap plastic from the U.S. in 2018, making it the sixth largest importer of U.S. plastic throughout the year.

Last month, India’s government also said it will ban scrap plastic imports as part of its efforts to strengthen the implementation of environmentally sound management of hazardous waste in the country.

Resource Recycling has more details:

After announcing stringent recovered paper import restrictions set to take effect this week, Indonesian officials changed course and postponed the rules indefinitely.

Indonesian inspection company KSO Sucofindo-Surveyor Indonesia sent a letter to customers on March 22, outlining increased inspection and bale quality requirements for recovered fiber shipments. According to the letter, the government initially planned to implement the restrictions on April 1.

The letter said Indonesian customs agents would begin inspecting 100 percent of shipments. That policy was first announced a year ago, but recently authorities have been inspecting just 10 percent of incoming loads.

Read the full article here.

The Vietnamese government has reiterated its plan to phase out scrap plastic imports altogether, noting all scrap plastic will be barred beginning in 2025.

VNExpress reported last week that the government of Vietnam announced the country “will not import plastic scrap from 2025” and will work through the backlog of scrap plastic containers that remain stuck at the country’s ports.

There were nearly 21,600 containers of recyclables sitting at ports as of late February, according to the article, and nearly half had been sitting for longer than three months.

Read the full article here.