China’s Zika Rules Not So Complicated

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People’s Republic of China (AQSIQ) announced earlier this year new requirements to prevent the spread of the ZIka virus for cargo coming from certain countries. The United States was recently added to the list. If the requirements cannot be met at origin and a Mosquito Eradication Certificate provided, then fumigation must be done on arrival at the port of destination and at the cost of the cargo. This could also cause delays of several days. The Mosquito Eradication Certificate does not require validation or stamping by any government authority and containers covered by a certificate will not require fumigation.

Several articles in the Journal of Commerce have provided excellent additional information. They report that containers shipped from the U.S. to China that are subject to that country’s regulations won’t have to be fumigated but can instead be disinfected, and government certification of the process is not required as once believed. One article also stated that the U.S. Foreign Commercial Service outlined the requirements of Chinese authorities after members of the U.S. Embassy in Beijing met with the Director General of China’s Inspection and Quarantine Ministry. Read the full JOC article here.

Several carriers have issued advisories and outlined some of the recent APHIS elements for all containers leaving the USA for China, regardless of the origin of the container. For example MSC has advised “In order to prevent the spread of the Zika virus, containers from all the involved countries shall be subject to effective anti-mosquito treatment.” MSC’s notice continued, “With immediate effect, it means that there is a need to provide a certificate of extermination of mosquito. If no certificate is provided, the buyer must fumigate the cargo at arrival at the port of destination.” Evergreen’s customer advisory states in part, “Shipment without mosquito treatment proof may subject to treatment at Port of Discharge by local inspector.”